Rowe v. Mass Transit. Admin.
| Decision Date | 28 July 2003 |
| Docket Number | No. CIV. AMD 02-216.,CIV. AMD 02-216. |
| Citation | 303 F.Supp.2d 596 |
| Parties | Earllen ROWE, Plaintiff v. MASS TRANSIT ADMINISTRATION, Phyllis J. Love, George Deaver, and Leonard Thompson, Defendants |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Maryland |
Michael J. Snider, Snider and Fischer LLC, Baltimore, MD, for Plaintiff.
Jessie Lyons Crawford, Callista Marie Freedman, J. Joseph Curran, Jr., Baltimore, MD, for Defendants.
Plaintiff, Earllen Rowe, a former employee of the Mass Transit Administration ("MTA"), an agency of the State of Maryland, filed this employment discrimination case in state court after her employment was terminated for misconduct. The defendants, who include three supervisory individuals who are sued solely in their official capacities, timely removed the case to this court. The claims asserted include the following: (1)denial of reasonable accommodation, disparate treatment, hostile environment, and retaliation claims pursuant to the Americans with Disabilities Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 12101-12117 ("ADA"), and the Rehabilitation Act, 29 U.S.C. § 794; and (2) race and gender disparate treatment claims, harassment claims, and retaliation claims pursuant to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq. ("Title VII"); and (3) redundant statutory and constitutional claims pursuant to 42 U.S.C. §§ 1981, 1983, 1985, and 1986. Discovery has been completed and defendants have filed a motion for summary judgment. The issues have been fully briefed and a hearing has been held. For the reasons stated herein, I shall grant defendants' motion.
Pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(c), summary judgment is appropriate "if the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any, show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 247, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986). A fact is material for purposes of summary judgment, if when applied to the substantive law, it affects the outcome of the litigation. Id. at 248, 106 S.Ct. 2505. Summary judgment is also appropriate when a party "fails to make a showing sufficient to establish the existence of an element essential to that party's case, and on which that party will bear the burden of proof at trial." Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322, 106 S.Ct. 2548, 91 L.Ed.2d 265 (1986).
A party opposing a properly supported motion for summary judgment bears the burden of establishing the existence of a genuine issue of material fact. Anderson, 477 U.S. at 248-49, 106 S.Ct. 2505. "When a motion for summary judgment is made and supported as provided in [Rule 56], an adverse party may not rest upon the mere allegations or denials of the adverse party's pleading, but the adverse party's response, by affidavit or as otherwise provided in [Rule 56] must set forth specific facts showing that there is a genuine issue for trial." Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(e). See Celotex Corp., 477 U.S. at 324, 106 S.Ct. 2548; Anderson, 477 U.S. at 252, 106 S.Ct. 2505; Shealy v. Winston, 929 F.2d 1009, 1012 (4th Cir.1991). Of course, the facts, as well as the justifiable inferences to be drawn therefrom, must be viewed in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party. See Matsushita Elec. Indust. Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U.S. 574, 587-88, 106 S.Ct. 1348, 89 L.Ed.2d 538 (1986). The court, however, has an affirmative obligation to prevent factually unsupported claims and defenses from proceeding to trial. See Felty v. Graves-Humphreys Co., 818 F.2d 1126, 1128 (4th Cir.1987).
Of course, the material facts shall be set forth in the light most favorable to plaintiff's version of events. Nevertheless, I am constrained to observe that plaintiff has taken broad liberties and claimed a robust literary license with the summary judgment record in numerous regards, e.g., by asserting as "facts" what are no more than argumentative contentions that rest on unreasonable and speculative presumptions as to the effect of historical occurrences, and by attempting to contort the summary judgment record to support wholly unreasonable inferences. For instance, as set forth below, the record makes clear (and plaintiff essentially conceded at her deposition) that all of plaintiff's claims arise out of events which occurred during a two week period of November 1999. Disregarding this reality (and her own Charge of Discrimination filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission), plaintiff has attempted to rely on events and interactions with defendant Love months before November 1999 (as well as events which occurred in the workplace while plaintiff was at home on leave after November 1999). I reject this attempt and regard the material facts of the case to be those arising in November 1999 as the record demonstrates. In a similar vein, plaintiff has made a transparent attempt to meld potential claims and remedies which she might have enjoyed under her union's collective bargaining agreement with statutory non-discrimination claims, e.g., she repeatedly describes the "light duty" assignment she was given as "illegal" because an arbitrator ultimately concluded that the subject of light duty assignments was properly a topic for negotiation under the applicable collective bargaining agreement. But this circumstance is irrelevant to the issues presented in this discrimination case, and plaintiffs desperate attempt to inject labor law/collective bargaining issues into this case is rejected as unavailing. Accordingly, the statement of facts set forth herein reflects these threshold determinations.
Rowe is a 52-year-old African-American. She was hired:on December 30, 1996, as a part-time bus operator and assigned to the Northwest Bus Division of the MTA. Shortly thereafter, she became a full-time bus operator and was soon reassigned to the MTA's Bush Street Division on February 1, 1998. Defendant Phyllis Love ("Love"), a white female, was the Chief of Bus Operations and Rowe's second level supervisor during the events giving rise to this case. Defendant George Deaver ("Deaver"), who is African-American, was an Assistant Superintendent and Rowe's first level supervisor. It was Deaver's decision to terminate Rowe's employment, but in any event both Love and Deaver were the principal decision-makers in respect to the adverse employment action taken against Rowe. Defendant Leonard Thompson ("Thompson") was the Supervisor of Mobility; he was not in Rowe's supervisory chain of command and he had no material role in any adverse employment action taken against Rowe. Assistant Superintendent James Seiling ("Seiling") was involved in certain material facts but has not been joined as a defendant.
On the evening of October 31, 1998, Halloween, Rowe was assaulted by several boys who threw eggs at her as she sat on her bus at a rest stop along her assigned route. In attempting to protect herself from further assault, Rowe apparently ran from the front of the bus toward the rear of the bus and in doing so she slipped on the broken eggs and fell. She injured her left arm and shoulder. (Rowe also suffered from certain non-physical psychological symptoms from the stress of the Halloween incident, although, beyond a short written evaluation prepared in November 1998, the record contains no information concerning the psychological impact of the Halloween assault on Rowe.)
As a result of the Halloween attack, Rowe filed a worker's compensation claim for the injuries to her shoulder. From the date of her injuries through the Fall of 1999, Rowe was regularly seen and treated by Douglas M. Shepard, M.D., her orthopaedist, who regularly certified her as disabled from her work responsibilities at the MTA. Eventually, Dr. Shepard concluded that Rowe had achieved maximum medical improvement without surgery and he recommended that she undergo arthroscopic surgery to repair a partially torn rotator cuff in her left shoulder. Dr. Shepard anticipated that Rowe would require at least a three month course of rehabilitation following her surgery before she could resume her bus driving duties. Rowe underwent surgery on October 13, 1999. The sutures were removed from her shoulder on October 26, 1999. Dr. Shepard instructed her to "wear a shoulder sling while out of the house to prevent inadvertent recurrent trauma." Rowe remained disabled from driving a bus and she remained on leave receiving worker's compensation benefits.
Meanwhile, prior to November 1999, the MTA had retained a consultant to design a program enabling an employee on disability leave, including worker's compensation leave, to return to work in a light duty capacity, provided the treating physician determined such an employee was able to do so. Thus, the consultant devised a so-called "Bridge Program," by creating a series of light duty jobs called "bridge assignments." Under the program, a list of "light duty" positions would be sent to an employee's treating physician, who, after assessing the requirements of her patient's proposed placement and considering any necessary restrictions on her patient's ability to perform the assigned tasks, including time limits and other restrictions, would complete a form releasing the patient/employee to work on the approved assignment. The program was initially implemented in November 1999 as a pilot project by MTA's Risk Management Office at the Bush Street Division in anticipation of system wide implementation.
Thus, on November 2, 1999, one week after Rowe's sutures had been removed, Love sent Dr. Shepard a packet of information introducing the program and requested that he determine whether Rowe was able to accept any of a variety of light duty assignments. In particular, Love apparently proposed to Dr. Shepard that Rowe be assigned duty as an "ADA Transit Ambassador." The essential functions of this...
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