Price v. Taco Bell Corp.
| Decision Date | 19 June 1996 |
| Docket Number | Civil No. 95-2-JO. |
| Parties | Anne R. PRICE, Plaintiff, v. TACO BELL CORPORATION, a foreign corporation, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Oregon |
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Jana Toran, Portland, OR, for Plaintiff.
Corbett Gordon, Corbett Gordon & Associates, Portland, OR, for Defendant.
Plaintiff, Anne R. Price, originally brought action against her former employer, Taco Bell Corporation ("defendant"), for racial discrimination in violation of 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq., 42 U.S.C. § 1981 and O.R.S. 659.030, and for age discrimination in violation of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act and O.R.S. 659.030.1 Plaintiff also brought an aiding and abetting claim against defendant Stewart. Defendants removed the case to federal court in January 1995. In earlier proceedings, this court dismissed plaintiff's claims against Stewart.
This case is now before me on defendant's motion for summary judgment in response to plaintiff's amended complaint. As explained below, plaintiff has offered sufficient evidence to create a material issue of fact as to whether defendant's failure to promote her was motivated by race. Therefore, defendant's motion is denied.
Plaintiff, an African-American woman, was employed by defendant as an assistant restaurant general manager ("ARGM") from August 1991, until April 1994, when she quit. Plaintiff claims that during her employment with defendant, she was discriminated against in defendant's failure to promote her to the position of restaurant general manager ("RGM"). The parties' evidence establishes the following chronology of events 1991: plaintiff hired as management trainee August 1991: plaintiff promoted to ARGM position January 1993: plaintiff tells her supervisor, Carl "Frosty" Swinford orally and in writing that it is not her goal to be an RGM July 1993: market manager Dara Dejbakhsh leaves defendant's employ, leaving the position vacant; September 1993: meeting held by group of managers who form a "review board" to evaluate potential management candidates; plaintiff is identified by this group as a potential candidate for promotion; November 1993: mega zone vice president, Julia Stewart, attends a "round table" meeting in Portland, at the request of Michael Swartz, team managed unit ("TMU") supervisor and market coordinator, to give Swartz feed back on whether six or seven individuals, including plaintiff, possess the qualifications for possible future promotion; two or three days after the review Swartz gives plaintiff a written assessment of the review meeting: board which states plaintiff is a good candidate for promotion and recommends a 30 day action plan; November 18, 1993: Swinford tells plaintiff that she is not going to be promoted; November or December 1993: Swartz is made RGM of the Beaverton-Hillsdale store; January 1994: Joe Ertman becomes market manager for the Portland market and is asked to perform his own assessment of the 38 stores under his supervision; February 1994: Ertman promotes Greg Jackson, ARGM and college graduate, to RGM; March 1994: Jeff Frank is hired to RGM position in plaintiff's store; March 1995: Camille Sherman, ARGM, is promoted to RGM; July 1995: Dave Patton is promoted to RGM.2
Plaintiff contends that because she received a favorable evaluation from the review board but was not promoted to RGM along with the other individuals brought in front of the "round table" meeting, defendant discriminated against her on the basis of her race.
Summary judgment should be granted if there are no genuine issues of material fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Fed. R.Civ.P. 56(c). If the moving party shows that there are no genuine issues of material fact, the non-moving party must go beyond the pleadings and designate facts showing an issue for trial. Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322-23, 106 S.Ct. 2548, 2552-53, 91 L.Ed.2d 265 (1986); Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 2510, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986). A scintilla of evidence, or evidence that is merely colorable or not significantly probative, does not present a genuine issue of material fact. United Steelworkers of America v. Phelps Dodge Corp., 865 F.2d 1539, 1542 (9th Cir.1989), cert. denied, 493 U.S. 809, 110 S.Ct. 51, 107 L.Ed.2d 20 (1989).
Substantive law governing a claim determines whether a fact is material. Anderson, 477 U.S. at 248, 106 S.Ct. at 2510, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986). Reasonable doubts as to the existence of a material factual issue are resolved against the moving party. T.W. Elec. Serv., Inc. v. Pacific Elec. Contractors Ass'n, 809 F.2d 626, 631 (9th Cir.1987). Finally, inferences drawn from facts are viewed in the light most favorable to the non-moving party. Id. at 630-31.
Title VII provides that "it shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer * * * to discriminate against any individual with respect to his compensation, terms, conditions or privileges of employment, because of such individual's race * * *." 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(a)(1). Plaintiff characterizes her claim in terms of disparate treatment, rather than disparate impact. In these types of cases, the Supreme Court in McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 93 S.Ct. 1817, 36 L.Ed.2d 668 (1973), and Texas Department of Community Affairs v. Burdine, 450 U.S. 248, 101 S.Ct. 1089, 67 L.Ed.2d 207 (1981), articulated the burdens of the parties as follows: (1) the complainant must first carry the initial burden of establishing a prima facie case of racial discrimination; (2) once plaintiff has made out a prima facie case, the burden shifts to the employer to articulate some legitimate, non-discriminatory reason for the employer's action; and (3) if the defendant articulates a legitimate non-discriminatory reason, plaintiff must then prove by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant's stated reason is pretextual. McDonnell Douglas, 411 U.S. at 802, 804, 93 S.Ct. at 1824, 1825; Burdine, 450 U.S. at 252-53, 256, 101 S.Ct. at 1093-94, 1095; see also Wallis v. J.R. Simplot, 26 F.3d 885, 889 (9th Cir.1994); Fragante v. City and County of Honolulu, 888 F.2d 591, 594-95 (9th Cir.1989).
The Supreme Court in Burdine made clear that the burden of establishing a prima facie case of discrimination is not onerous. See Burdine, 450 U.S. at 253, 101 S.Ct. at 1093-94. The Ninth Circuit has articulated a clear test for determining whether a plaintiff has made out a prima facie case. A plaintiff "must offer evidence that `gives rise to an inference of unlawful discrimination.'" Lowe v. City of Monrovia, 775 F.2d 998 (9th Cir. 1985) (citing Burdine, 450 U.S. at 253, 101 S.Ct. at 1094). The Ninth Circuit found that a common way to establish a prima facie case of discrimination was for a plaintiff to meet the four requirements set forth in McDonnell Douglas:
Lowe, 775 F.2d at 1005 (citing McDonnell Douglas, 411 U.S. at 802, 93 S.Ct. at 1824).
In this case, it is undisputed that plaintiff was a member of a protected class. All other aspects of plaintiff's prima facie case are disputed.
Defendant makes several arguments in support of its motion for summary judgment: (1) plaintiff did not apply for a RGM position, and Ertman was unaware that plaintiff was interested in an RGM position; (2) at the time in question, there were no open RGM positions to which to promote plaintiff; (3) if the court finds that there were RGM positions available at the time, plaintiff was not qualified for an RGM position; and (4) other RGM positions that became available were filled by more qualified individuals. I will address each of these arguments in turn.
As part of its argument that plaintiff has not met the prima facie elements, defendant suggests that plaintiff never applied for a RGM position. There is some question as to whether Ertman knew that plaintiff was interested in being a RGM. Plaintiff states in her deposition:
Later in her deposition, plaintiff states that she told Ertman that she was interested in a RGM position.
Defendant produced an affidavit of Joe Ertman in which he states that:
no one ever came to me and suggested that Anne Price be promoted. * * * Mr. Swinford never told me that Anne Price sought promotion to the position of RGM. Ms. Price never explicitly told me she was seeking a promotion, although I understood that she was interested in additional management responsibilities. I began assessing her — and all my other ARGMs — to determine who would be promotable. I had not completed that assessment when Ms. Price took her leave of absence in the Spring of 1994.
Ertman Affidavit, p. 3. Defendant also produced a statement of personal goals written by plaintiff in which plaintiff stated "it is not my goal to be a GM."3
There is no evidence on the record of any application form completed by plaintiff for an RGM position. This may be because, as plaintiff testified, she considered her appearance before the review board to be an...
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