Ortega v. Chi. Bd. of Educ.

• Decision Date: 21 November 2017
• Docket Number: No. 11 C 8477,11 C 8477
• Citation: 280 F.Supp.3d 1072
• Parties: Linda ORTEGA, Plaintiff, v. CHICAGO BOARD OF EDUCATION, Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of Illinois

280 F.Supp.3d 1072

Linda ORTEGA, Plaintiff,

v.CHICAGO BOARD OF EDUCATION, Defendant.

No. 11 C 8477

United States District Court, N.D. Illinois, Eastern Division.

Signed November 21, 2017

Hyun Ah Lee, Deidre Baumann, Baumann & Shuldiner, Chicago, IL, for Plaintiff.

Lisa A. Dreishmire, Lucille A Blackburn, Susan Margaret O'Keefe, Board of Education of the City of Chicago Law Department, Chicago, IL, for Defendant.

Thomas M. Durkin, United States District Judge

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

Linda Ortega was a tenured teacher in the Chicago Public School ("CPS") system. She taught fifth grade at Hedges Elementary until the principal of that school terminated her after determining she no longer met the requirements for her position. Ortega brought this lawsuit alleging intentional discrimination by the principal and her employer, the Chicago Board of Education ("the Board"), in violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act ("ADA"), 42 U.S.C. §§ 12111 – 117. Summary judgment was entered in favor of the principal because the ADA provides a right of action against the employer but not the employee's supervisor. Ortega's discrimination claims against the Board went to trial on October 13–16, and 19, 2015, and the jury returned a verdict in Ortega's favor, awarding her $285,000 in compensatory damages.¹

Following the jury's verdict, the parties appeared before the Court on numerous occasions to address disputes over the equitable relief, if any, to which Ortega might be entitled as a result of the jury's finding of intentional discrimination. On August 15, 2016, the Court held a hearing to allow the introduction of additional evidence on the equitable relief question. After careful consideration of the evidence introduced at the equitable relief hearing, as well as the evidence submitted at trial and the legal briefs filed thereafter, the Court now concludes that Ortega is entitled to equitable relief in the form of back pay, prejudgment interest, front pay, and lost pension benefits, as more fully set forth below.

GOVERNING PRINCIPLES

The ADA incorporates the remedies available to a plaintiff in a Title VII discrimination action. See 42 U.S.C. § 12117(a) ; 42 U.S.C. § 1981a(a)(2). Those remedies include compensatory damages "for future pecuniary losses, emotional pain, suffering, inconvenience, mental anguish, loss of enjoyment of life, and other nonpecuniary losses." 42 U.S.C. § 1981a(b)(3). For employers such as the Board (more than 500 employees), compensatory damages are capped at $300,000, although the jury is not informed of this cap. See 42 U.S.C. § 1981a(b)(3)(D), § 1981a(c)(2). The jury's $285,000 compensatory award is within the statutory cap, and is not before the Court in this opinion. Instead, the issue to be decided is whether Ortega is entitled to one or more of the remedies specifically excluded from the jury's compensatory award, namely, "back pay, interest on back pay, or any other type of relief authorized under ... [ 42 U.S.C. § 2000e–5(g) ]." 42 U.S.C. § 1981a(b)(2).

Back pay and other forms of equitable relief are available in an ADA case, see 42 U.S.C. § 1981a(a)(2) ; 42 U.S.C § 2000e–5(g)(1), but the decision of whether to award them is reserved for the trial court. See Pals v. Schepel Buick & GMC Truck, Inc. , 220 F.3d 495, 500 (7th Cir. 2000). When making that decision, the trial court "must respect the findings implied by the jury's verdict," id. , but is otherwise vested "with broad discretion to fashion a remedy for unlawful discrimination," E.E.O.C. v. Ilona of Hungary, Inc. , 108 F.3d 1569, 1580 (7th Cir. 1997). The guiding principle in exercising that discretion is that the court "has not merely the power but the duty to render a decree which will so far as possible eliminate the discriminatory effects of the past as well as bar like discrimination in the future." Albemarle Paper Co. v. Moody , 422 U.S. 405, 418, 95 S.Ct. 2362, 45 L.Ed.2d 280 (1975) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). "And where a legal injury is of an economic character, [t]he general rule is, that ...[t]he injured party is to be placed, as near as may be, in the situation he would have occupied if the wrong had not been committed." Id. at 418–19, 95 S.Ct. 2362 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted); see also Ford Motor Co. v. Equal Emp't Opportunity Comm'n , 458 U.S. 219, 230, 102 S.Ct. 3057, 73 L.Ed.2d 721 (1982) (the statutory aim is "to make the victims of unlawful discrimination whole by restoring them, so far as possible ... to a position where they would have been were it not for the unlawful discrimination") (internal quotations and citation omitted).

BACK PAY

A. OVERVIEW

"Complete relief for a victim of discrimination generally will include an award of back pay; indeed, such an award is presumptively proper once a violation has been shown." Ilona of Hungary, Inc., 108 F.3d at 1580 (citing Equal Emp't Opportunity Comm'n v. O & G Spring and Wire Forms Specialty Co. , 38 F.3d 872, 880 (7th Cir. 1994), and United States v. City of Chicago , 853 F.2d 572, 575 (7th Cir. 1988) ). Back pay represents the wages the plaintiff would have earned had she not been fired. See 7th Cir. Pattern Civil Jury Instruction 3.11 (2015). Included in this calculation are any "benefits [s]he would have received from the Defendant if [s]he had not been [terminated]." Id.

Ortega seeks an award of net lost wages through August 15, 2016² and prejudgment interest in the total amount of $363,413.43. See R. 178 at 7. In addition, Ortega seeks lost pension benefits in the amount of $433,222.00, representing the estimated present value of the total monthly teacher's pension payments she could have anticipated receiving beginning at age 62 had she not been terminated. See R. 180 at 3.³ The total amount of the back pay award requested by Ortega is $769,635.43.⁴ She also asks for an additional unspecified amount to reflect back pay from the date of the equitable relief hearing through the date judgment is entered.⁵

The Board argues, on the other hand, that Ortega's entitlement to back pay should be limited in two respects: first, by her failure to mitigate her damages; and, second, by a stipulation to a back pay amount to which the parties agreed during the trial. The Board has been inconsistent about whether it is seeking to impose both of these limitations at the same time, and its most current position on that question remains unclear. In addition, the Board takes issue with Ortega's calculation of net lost wages, and further argues that Ortega should not recover any prejudgment interest because of her purported delay in this litigation. Taking these arguments into account, the Board provides the Court with three back pay options. First, the Board suggests that Ortega is entitled to net lost wages only through June 19, 2012 (the date on which she allegedly stopped mitigating her damages) in the amount of $33,335, to which the Board would add $2,333.45 in lost pension contributions, for a total back pay award of $35,668.45. R. 179 at 7. In what the Court will assume is an alternative calculation, the Board argues Ortega is entitled to the stipulated amount of $215,835 in back pay, although the Board is unclear whether it believes the stipulated amount is subject to further deductions.⁶ If the Court rejects either of these positions, the Board argues Ortega is entitled to net lost wages through August 15, 2016 in the amount of $254,022.05, to which the Board would add $17,781.54 in lost pension contributions, for a total back pay award of $271,803.59. R. 179 at 7; R. 179–1 at 2.⁷

The Court will begin by reviewing the evidence regarding Ortega's job history. The Court then will address the Board's affirmative defense of failure to mitigate, followed by the Board's argument that the parties' trial stipulation serves to limit the amount of Ortega's back pay award. Next, the Court will resolve disputed issues related to the net lost wages calculation and prejudgment interest on net lost wages.⁸ The Court will conclude the back pay issue by discussing whether Ortega is entitled to an additional award representing back pay and prejudgment interest through the date on which judgment is entered. The Court will reserve the issue of pension benefits until the end of this opinion.

B. ORTEGA'S JOB HISTORY

Ortega began her employment with the Board on January 26, 1998. R. 139 at 79 (Tr. Transcript 143); R. 184 at 40–41; Def. Ex. X.⁹ She was removed from her teaching position at Hedges Elementary on June 19, 2009. Because she was a tenured teacher, after her removal Ortega was placed in the reassigned teacher's pool for one year. The reassigned teacher's pool is a benefit given by the Board to tenured teachers who lose their job. See R. 141 at 82 (Tr. Transcript 650). During her time in the reassigned teacher's pool, Ortega received full pay (approximately $71,958 per year, R. 139 at 122, 127–28 (Tr. Transcript 186, 191–92)), while applying for open teaching positions and working for the Board as a substitute teacher. Id. at 122–27 (Tr. Transcript 186–91).

On June 19, 2010, Ortega moved from the reassigned teacher's pool to the substitute teacher's cadre. The substitute teacher's cadre is the second-year benefit given to a tenured teacher who has not found another teaching position after spending one year in the reassigned teacher's pool. The pay of a cadre substitute teacher is substantially less than the pay of a reassigned teacher. If a teacher's time in the cadre is up and she still has not been appointed to a permanent position, her employment with the Board is terminated. R. 141 at 127–29 (Tr. Transcript 191–93). Ortega supplemented her income as a cadre substitute teacher with a job as a part-time professor at City Colleges of Chicago. Id. at 167–68 (Tr. Transcript 231–32). Her employment with the Board ended altogether sometime in 2011. See R. 184 at 165.¹⁰

For more than a year after her final separation from the Board, the only...