Mooney v. Roller Bearing Co. of Am.
| Decision Date | 05 April 2022 |
| Docket Number | C20-01030-LK |
| Parties | RICHARD MOONEY, Plaintiff, v. ROLLER BEARING COMPANY OF AMERICA, INC., Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Western District of Washington |
This matter comes before the Court on the parties' cross motions for summary judgment. Plaintiff Richard Mooney filed a motion for summary judgment on some of Defendant's affirmative defenses. Dkt. No. 26. Mooney also filed a motion for summary judgment on certain elements of his claims under the Family and Medical Leave Act (“FMLA”) and the Washington Law Against Discrimination (“WLAD”), Dkt. No. 28 [1] and a motion to strike one of the responses filed by Defendant Roller Bearing Company of America, Inc. (“RBC”), Dkt. No. 51. Mooney also moved to strike RBC's expert report and references thereto. Dkt. No. 42. RBC has filed a motion for summary judgment on all of Mooney's claims, Dkt. No. 33, and a motion to seal portions of that motion and a supporting exhibit, Dkt. No. 32.
Having reviewed the motions and the balance of the record, the Court grants in part and denies in part Mooney's motion for summary judgment on RBC's affirmative defenses, grants in part and denies in part Mooney's motion for summary judgment on elements of his FMLA and WLAD claims, denies RBC's motion for summary judgment, denies Mooney's motion to strike RBC's expert report and references thereto, grants Mooney's motion to strike RBC's response, and denies RBC's motion to seal.
When Richard Mooney began working for RBC as a sales engineer in March 2018, he had 40 years of prior experience in sales. Dkt. No. 29-1 at 21, 58.[2] RBC manufactures bearings and other engineered products, catering to both industrial and aerospace clients, and Mooney worked for the “industrial side.” Id. at 58; Dkt. No. 37-19 at 51. His job duties included making sales calls, getting engineering assistance on projects, and trying to take business from competitors. Id. at 58- 59. Mooney's salary was $100, 000 per year, and he was an at will employee. Dkt. No. 37-1.
Mooney's sales territory initially included Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. Dkt. No. 29-1 at 59. After he had been with the company for about eight months, his sales territory was expanded to include British Columbia and Alberta, Canada, and he had significant difficulty keeping up with his workload. Id; Dkt. No. 37-13 at 2.
Among other job responsibilities, Mooney was expected to write a certain No. of reports of calls (“ROCs”) per month “covering the high points of impactful sales calls.” Dkt. No. 37-6. RBC used ROCs to inform Mooney's supervisor, Regional Sales Manager John Talley, about Mooney's projects or sales calls in his territory; to inform product managers about potential opportunities to help secure business; and to inform upper management, including the company's CEO, about sales progress. Dkt. No. 37-2 at 49. Mooney knew that it was important to document sales calls “[s]o people know what's going on, and so that there is a record, ” and he also knew the ROCs were very important to RBC's management. Dkt. 37-5 at 66, 82.
Throughout 2018, Talley had several conversations and sent multiple emails to Mooney about the need to write ROCs and how Mooney was falling short in that area. Dkt. No. 37-2 at 42 (); Id. at 45 (); Id. at 48-49 (advising Mooney that ROCs go to upper management, and that they notice when employees are not writing ROCs); Dkt. Nos. 37-9, 37-10, 37-11. Talley informed Mooney in an email in December 2018 that “[h]aving no ROC reports at RBC is a death sentence” and that Mooney should “take this seriously or problems will surely arise.” Dkt. No. 37-7.
In February 2019, RBC placed Mooney on a 60-day performance improvement plan (“PIP”) because he was “falling too far short” of the company's expectations regarding writing ROCs. Dkt. No. 37-6; see also Dkt. No. 29-1 at 71. The PIP explained that if Mooney's performance did not improve or was not maintained after the PIP period ended, he could be discharged. Dkt. No. 37-6.
Mooney's fiscal year 2019 performance evaluation, which covered his performance from March 2018 through March 2019, stated that he needed “to work more with Salesforce and develop more required ROC's in a timely manner.” Dkt. No. 59-1 at 4. That was the only annual performance evaluation Mooney received while at RBC. Mooney signed his evaluation in July 2019. Dkt. No. 37-22.
In September 2019, Christopher Curran, RBC's Vice President of Business Development, sent to Steve Ross, the Director of Industrial Sales & Marketing, the resume of another employee, Mike Carroll, as a potential hire in case they decided to “make a move with Dick Mooney.” Dkt. No. 37-26 at 6, 18-19. Ross spoke with Talley about potentially letting Mooney go and replacing him with someone else. Dkt. No. 37-20 at 96. However, Carroll was not interested in the position at that time and the matter was apparently dropped. Id. at 65-66; Dkt. No. 29-8 at 65-66.
Around the same time, Talley sent Mooney a new version of his fiscal year 2019 performance evaluation that incorporated revisions from Ross. Dkt. No. 56 at 2; Dkt. No. 37-23. Ross had added detail regarding Mooney's placement on the PIP, specifically noting that “since we started Salesforce in April [2019], [Mooney] has only written 9 ROC reports in over 4 months, well below the expected average for his territory.” Compare Dkt. No. 37-22 at ECF 5 with Dkt. No. 37-23 at ECF 6. In late September 2019, Ross, Talley, and Mooney met to discuss Mooney's annual performance evaluation. Dkt. No. 55-9 at 41-42. During the meeting, they discussed the need to complete ROCs and asked Mooney to include a plan to grow his territory in the evaluation. Id. at 42. Ross asked Mooney to work with Talley to make these edits. Id. at 43.
Completion of the edits appears to have been delayed until December 2019 due to Talley taking leave from RBC. Id. at 43-44. On December 14, 2019, Ross emailed Mooney's completed fiscal year 2019 performance evaluation to Tom King, RBC's Vice President of Administration, noting that the evaluation “documents [Mooney's] performance issues, but does not state an ultimatum.” Dkt. 59-5 at 2. Ross also informed King that he and Talley would advise Mooney “that he is receiving zero increase for last year due to his performance (or lack thereof) on the PIP and his continued failure to consistently write ROC's.” Id. at 1. On January 6, 2020, Ross emailed the finalized evaluation to Talley, informing him that it was ready for Mooney to sign and emphasizing that Mooney had not written a ROC in over two months. Id. at 1-2. Mooney signed the evaluation the same day. Id. at 1. Mooney acknowledged in the evaluation that he “need[ed] to improve [his] reporting capabilities, particularly the ROC in Salesforce.” Dkt. No. 37-12 at 5.
When Talley informed Mooney that he would not be receiving a merit-based pay increase, he explained that it was because of Mooney's failure to submit ROCs as required. Dkt. No. 37-2 at 121. Despite that performance issue, RBC had “no thoughts” of letting Mooney go in January 2020, before the COVID-19 pandemic. Dkt. No. 55-9 at 53.
On January 11, 2020, after receiving the performance evaluation and news that he would not receive a pay raise, Mooney wrote a lengthy email to Talley and to Cathy DePaola, RBC's Director of Human Resources for the East Coast. Dkt. No. 59-6. Mooney expressed his dismay with RBC's delay of 10 months in finalizing his annual review, and stated that it was troubling that, “as conveyed to [him], ” the decision not to give him a pay raise for his performance in the 2019 fiscal year was “largely based on” poor reporting performance after that fiscal year. Id. at ECF 2. Mooney further stated that he was “disappointed but not shocked by RBC management's decision not to give [him] either a cost of living or merit increase for [his] performance” during the 2019 fiscal year. Id. at ECF 2-3. He emphasized that the addition of the Canadian territory to his responsibilities more than tripled his sales area, yet “RBC unrealistically maintained expectations that [he] would not only work 2 territories, but that [he] would also spend an additional 10-15 hours per week to complete all the requisite and redundant reports for both jobs.” Id. at ECF 3. Mooney stated that “[e]ffectively . . . working 2 full time jobs for over a year” brought him “an unprecedented level of stress, ” and he informed Talley and DePaola that he would be taking a leave of absence as recommended by his doctor to address his “depressive illness.” Id. He attached a letter from his doctor recommending that he take time off from work. Id. at ECF 5.
The following workday, RBC's Payroll and Benefits Supervisor sent FMLA paperwork to Mooney for his doctor to complete. Dkt. No. 37-14. Mooney submitted the completed paperwork to RBC on January 16, 2020. Dkt. No. 37-15. On the FMLA form the doctor stated that Mooney was “quite depressed” and would be incapacitated from working from January 10, 2020 through February 15, 2020. Id. at ECF 4-5. The doctor also indicated that episodic flare-ups could periodically prevent Mooney from performing his job functions in the...
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