Morales-Vallellanes v. Potter

Decision Date04 August 2003
Docket NumberNo. 02-2190.,02-2190.
Citation339 F.3d 9
PartiesAngel David MORALES-VALLELLANES, Plaintiff, Appellant v. John E. POTTER, UNITED STATES Postmaster General; American Postal Workers Union, Puerto Rico Area Local (A.P.W.U.-P.R.A.L.) A.F.L.-C.I.O.; Daniel Soto, President A.P.W.U.-P.R.A.L.; Enrique Lopez, Defendants, Appellees.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit

Miguel E. Miranda-Gutiérrez for appellant.

Arturo Luciano-Delgado for appellees American Postal Workers Union and Daniel Soto.

David G. Karro, with whom Guillermo Gil, United States Attorney, Fidel A. Sevillano Del Rio, Assistant United States Attorney, Eric J. Scharf, and Stephan J. Boardman were on brief, for appellee United States Postal Service.

Before TORRUELLA, SELYA, and LIPEZ, Circuit Judges.

LIPEZ, Circuit Judge.

Plaintiff Angel David Morales-Vallellanes ("Morales") brought this action against the United States Postal Service ("USPS" or "the Postal Service") alleging that he was the target of retaliatory and discriminatory acts provoked by complaints that he filed with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration ("OSHA"). Morales also sued the American Postal Workers Union ("APWU" or "the Union") and its president, Daniel Soto, in the same action, claiming that the Union breached its duty of fair representation by failing to submit and process his grievances against USPS.

The United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico referred the case to a magistrate judge, who recommended that the court grant motions for summary judgment submitted by defendants USPS and the Union. Morales filed a lengthy objection to the report and recommendation, essentially restating the allegations in his amended complaint, but also incorporating sixty-seven new exhibits that had not previously been brought to the magistrate judge's attention. Concluding that "Plaintiff ... failed to raise any material issue not adequately addressed by the magistrate judge in his Report," the district court adopted the magistrate judge's report and recommendation, and granted the defendants' motions for summary judgment. After careful review, we affirm in part and reverse in part.

I.

We summarize the relevant facts from the summary judgment record, reciting them in the light most favorable to Morales. See Diaz v. City of Fitchburg, 176 F.3d 560, 561 (1st Cir.1999). In 1988, Morales was hired to work as a distribution and window clerk at the Caparra Heights, Puerto Rico, Station of the United States Postal Service. On April 7, 1995, plaintiff filed a letter with OSHA complaining of dust accumulation, rodent infestation, and other unsanitary conditions at the Caparra Heights station. OSHA ordered the station manager to correct the violations by June 19, 1995, but to no avail. Morales renewed his OSHA complaint through certified letters to the OSHA Area Director on August 1, 1995, February 23, 1996, and April 6, 1996. Finally, on June 14, 1996, OSHA conducted a formal inspection of the Caparra Heights station and confirmed plaintiff's allegations. OSHA cited the Caparra Heights station for at least five violations, and directed the station to remedy the safety and health hazards by October 9, 1996.

At this point, we bifurcate our chronology of the subsequent events for purposes of clarity, turning first to the circumstances that spawned Morales's claims against the Postal Service, and concluding with an account of the events underlying plaintiff's claims against the Union.

A. Events underlying the claims against USPS

Throughout the OSHA complaint process, the agency assured Morales that his identity as an OSHA complainant would be kept confidential, and that federal law forbade USPS from retaliating or discriminating against him for whistle-blowing. Nevertheless, plaintiff's amended complaint alleges that by July 1995 other employees at the Caparra Heights station were aware that he had filed OSHA complaints, and were retaliating against him. That month, Morales alerted the Postal Inspection Service that he had received two threats from co-workers, but no remedial steps were taken.

In January 1996, plaintiff expressed interest in an available distribution and window clerk position with Saturdays and Sundays off.1 USPS then allegedly reclassified the position to offer only Sundays and Thursdays off so as to decrease its desirability to plaintiff. On March 23, 1996, Enrique Lopez, the Caparra Heights station supervisor, issued a letter of warning to Morales for unsatisfactory performance, citing the plaintiff's "abuse of coffee breaks." Two months later, Lopez removed Morales from his position as a Business Reply Mail Clerk, Postage Due Clerk and Express Mail Clerk,2 and replaced him with a female co-worker. In July 1996, tires on Morales's car were punctured on two separate occasions while the car was parked in the secured Caparra Heights station parking lot.

On October 10, 1996, Morales's contact at OSHA informed him that the agency had no authority to protect postal employees from retaliation, and urged the plaintiff to request USPS to conduct an internal investigation. Without seeking Morales's consent, OSHA forwarded his file to the Postal Service, thereby confirming to USPS that plaintiff was in fact the whistle-blower. From that point on, the retaliation and discrimination directed at plaintiff worsened considerably. Morales alleged that in December 1996 he was victimized by episodes of name-calling and bullying, and later that month he was suspended one week for violating a new uniform policy instituted by Lopez. In January 1997, a postal employee poured sugar into the gas tank of plaintiff's car, nearly resulting in a traffic accident. On at least three occasions in February, plaintiff's supervisor dismissed him from work without pay because "there was no work available for him." Finally, on February 20, 1997, plaintiff was transferred from the Caparra Heights station to the General Post Office in San Juan. Morales alleges that he was removed from the Caparra Heights station because co-workers accused him of being "a safety hazard and a homosexual."

These events prompted Morales to file four Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) complaints with the USPS.3 Plaintiff filed his first precomplaint on February 15, 1996, in the aftermath of USPS's decision to alter the allotted days off for the available distribution and window clerk position. His second EEO precomplaint, submitted April 25, 1996, alleged that a new coffee and lunch break policy instituted at the Caparra Heights station unfairly discriminated against male postal employees. After the USPS failed to respond to his first precomplaint, Morales filed a formal EEO complaint on April 3, 1996, alleging that USPS unlawfully retaliated against him by posting the available window clerk position with Thursday/Sunday rest days rather than Saturday/Sunday rest days. He subsequently filed a second formal EEO complaint on September 5, 1996, citing the discriminatory break policy and another episode of retaliation. Plaintiff finally left the employ of the USPS in early September 1997, allegedly as the result of a constructive discharge.

B. Events underlying the claims against APWU

In 1991, long before the events at issue here, Morales had been appointed shop steward of the Caparra Heights station by defendant Soto's predecessor, but was removed shortly thereafter for reasons that are unclear. Six years later, the Union elected Soto as its new president, and Morales petitioned him repeatedly for a second tour as shop steward. Soto capitulated, appointing Morales to the position on January 17, 1997. However, plaintiff's tenure ended abruptly three weeks later after Soto received complaints that Morales was acting inappropriately toward co-workers, and abusing his union status to avenge himself on USPS management.

Morales alleges that his dismissal as union shop steward was motivated by a conspiracy between USPS and APWU to remove him from his job at the Caparra Heights station, in violation of the Union's bylaws. Plaintiff also claims that the Union failed to process his grievances arising from two February 1997 dismissals from work, or take any action with respect to his constructive discharge.

II.

Morales filed an amended complaint consolidating his numerous allegations of wrongdoing into four counts. Count I, entitled "Retaliation and Discrimination," alleges that USPS unlawfully retaliated against plaintiff for filing OSHA claims, EEO complaints, and unfair labor practice charges. Count II, entitled "Conspiracy," accuses the USPS and APWU of "conspir[ing] against Plaintiff to cause his removal as Caparra Heights Shop Steward and later on his removal from Caparra Heights Station." Count III alleges 1) that USPS violated the collective bargaining agreement ("CBA"), and 2) that APWU breached its duty of fair representation "by arbitrarily, capriciously, in bad faith and/or invidiously failing to process timely Plaintiff's grievances through [USPS's] grievance procedure." Finally, Count IV claims intentional infliction of emotional distress arising from the "outrageous acts and omissions, retaliatory conduct, and discrimination" perpetrated by USPS and APWU.

As a preliminary matter, plaintiff's failure to cite any statutory basis for relief in his amended complaint complicates our review of his claims. However, under the liberal "notice pleading" requirements of Rule 8 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, this deficiency is not fatal to plaintiff's case:

A complaint need not point to the appropriate statute or law in order to raise a claim for relief under Rule 8.... [A] complaint sufficiently raises a claim even if it points to no legal theory or even if it points to the wrong legal theory as a basis for that claim, as long as relief is possible under any set of facts that could be established consistent with the allegations.

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