Stewart v. Dist. of Columbia
| Docket Number | 18-CV-0777 |
| Decision Date | 16 March 2023 |
| Citation | 290 A.3d 937 |
| Parties | Troy STEWART, Appellant, v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, et al., Appellees. |
| Court | D.C. Court of Appeals |
Kirk R. Ruthenburg, with whom Daniel Morris and Matthew A. Lafferman, Washington, were on the brief, for appellant.
Sarah L. Knapp, Assistant Attorney General, with whom Karl A. Racine, Attorney General for the District of Columbia at the time of argument, Loren AliKhan, Solicitor General at the time of argument, Caroline S. Van Zile, Deputy Solicitor General, and Lewis Preston, Assistant Attorney General, were on the brief, for appellees.
Before Beckwith, Associate Judge, and Ruiz and Thompson,* Senior Judges.
Opinion by Senior Judge Thompson, dissenting in part, at page 948.
Plaintiff/appellant, Troy Stewart, a former correctional officer employed by the District of Columbia Department of Corrections (DOC), argues that the trial court erred in granting summary judgment in favor of defendants/appellees, District of Columbia and Major Joseph Pettiford, on Mr. Stewart's District of Columbia Whistleblower Protection Act (DCWPA) claim.1 For the reasons that follow, we affirm in part and reverse in part.
Appellant's DCWPA claim involves two correctional officer/inmate interactions that took place at the D.C. Jail Northwest II housing unit on April 10, 2015, and two incident reports made the same day. At the time, appellant was a probationary correctional officer, and Major Pettiford was part of DOC's senior management at the jail. Appellant was assigned to the Northwest II unit along with Corporal (Cpl.) Pablo Rodriguez,2 who was in command, and Cpl. Jonathan Evans.
According to the complaint, on the day in question, Rodriguez assigned appellant and Evans to conduct an inmate count while the inmates were on lockdown. While conducting the count, appellant and Evans worked from opposite ends of a hallway (or tier) of cells and converged near Cell 71, where they both stopped and observed that the inmate in Cell 71 had covered the cell's window with a sheet, such that he could not be seen. Evans instructed the inmate to remove the sheet, but the inmate refused. Evans asked Rodriguez, who was in the Northwest II guard station—a monitoring station known as "the Bubble," where correctional officers can observe activities throughout the unit—to give him access to Cell 71 electronically.
Once the cell door was opened and Evans had removed the sheet, appellant stepped away from the cell to resume his inmate count. Appellant alleges that he then "heard a loud noise," "turned around," "saw a piece of orange jumpsuit," and "saw [the inmate] in the cell and the cell door closing." Security camera footage shows that the inmate had partially emerged from his cell and scuffled momentarily with Evans before being pushed back inside. Appellant contends that he did not see the physical struggle, but only saw and assisted Evans's effort to close the cell door.
When the cell door closed, appellant continued walking along the tier and resumed counting. Security camera footage shows that as appellant faced away from Cell 71, Evans thrust his clipboard into the horizontal food slot of the door to Cell 71. Appellant contends that he did not see Evans put his clipboard into the slot, but that he heard yelling coming from Cell 71. Appellant walked back towards the cell, found that the inmate was "babbling," and determined that Evans was arguing with the inmate. Appellant alleges that when he told Evans to disengage with the inmate, Evans ordered him to proceed with his inmate count. Appellant complied.3 The surveillance video shows that while appellant was still near the door to Cell 71, the inmate threw liquid from the toilet at appellant through the slot in the cell door.
When appellant completed his inmate count, he returned to the Bubble and told Rodriguez, three times, that the inmate was "down there babbling about something" and that Rodriguez "need[ed] to check on the welfare" of the inmate because "something [was] wrong down there." Appellant also told Rodriguez that "Evans don't [sic] want me down there."
After visiting Cell 71 and observing that the inmate's lip was bleeding, Rodriguez took the inmate to the infirmary. Both appellant and Evans were instructed to complete incident report (DCDC-1) forms. In the report that he submitted, appellant wrote the following:
On, 4/10/15 at approximately 3:15 PM, I OFC Stewart was assigned to NW #2 Housing Unit. As I OFC Stewart was doing the count I notice [sic] Cpl. J. Evans was talk [sic] to inmate ... then I walk [sic] over to cell 71. And inmate [name redacted] was talking [sic] very high voice. Then Cpl. J. Evans told me to keep counting its [sic] ok. I did the count and went to the bubble. And then Cpl. Rodriguez went to cell 71 ... and took [the inmate] to the infirmary.
In response to the form's question, "[i]f force was used, describe type (i.e. physical, chemical agent, baton, etc.)," appellant responded "No." In response to the form's directive to "[d]escribe injuries to staff or inmate," appellant responded "N/A."
After reviewing appellant's incident report, Lieutenant MaRion Boyd ordered appellant to go with him to Major Pettiford's office. Appellant's complaint alleges that after reviewing appellant's incident report, Pettiford told appellant "to change material facts in his incident report" because "[t]his kind of statement can make you lose your job." Appellant testified during his deposition that Pettiford, a minute after being handed appellant's just-completed written report, confronted him, saying, 4 Appellant asserts that he understood Pettiford to be asking him to falsify his report, presumably in order to protect Evans. Appellant testified in his deposition that he refused to do so and told Pettiford, "That's my report and that's what I saw." Appellant's complaint further alleges that Boyd told him that the Deputy Warden wanted appellant to change his report.
On April 15, 2015, Pettiford submitted a memorandum to Warden William Smith and Deputy Warden Lennard Johnson. Pettiford recommended that appellant "not be retained past his [p]robationary [p]eriod and that he be immediately removed from his position" because of appellant's: (1) denial that he witnessed interactions between the inmate and Evans (even after he was allowed to view the video surveillance footage), (2) refusal to submit a factual report, (3) lack of integrity, and (4) "willingness to hide behind the so called ‘thin blue line.’ " Warden Smith recommended to DOC Director Thomas Faust that he terminate appellant's probationary employment because appellant "wasn't being truthful about the situation." After reviewing the Warden's recommendation and supporting documentation, Faust accepted the recommendation. Appellant was terminated on April 22, 2015.
On April 14, 2016, appellant filed a complaint against the District and Pettiford alleging retaliatory discharge in violation of the DCWPA. Appellant alleged—either in his complaint or in his supplemental interrogatory responses—that he was terminated in retaliation for his: (1) verbal disclosure of the Cell 71 inmate's condition after his interaction with Evans, (2) written report relating to the same incident, and (3) refusal to comply with an illegal order to falsify his incident report and thereby assist in an attempted cover-up of Evans's misconduct.5 The District moved for summary judgment, arguing that appellant did not make any disclosure protected under the DCWPA. The District also argued that, even if appellant had made protected disclosures, no disinterested observer viewing the surveillance video could conclude that appellant—who failed to submit a complete report and refused to supplement his report when asked to do so—refused to comply with an illegal order because correctional officers are required to submit accurate reports of any significant events such as confrontations or use of force that they observe or are aware of within the facility.
The trial court entered summary judgment in favor of appellees. The court found that appellant's evidence was insufficient as a matter of law to establish DCWPA violations. Appellant contends that the trial court erred in granting summary judgment because his verbal and written reports constituted DCWPA-protected disclosures and because there is a genuine dispute of material fact as to what he saw and whether Pettiford ordered him to falsify his report.
In reviewing a grant of summary judgment, we view "the record in the light most favorable to the non-moving party, drawing all reasonable inferences from the evidence in the non-moving party's favor." Medhin v. Hailu , 26 A.3d 307, 310 (D.C. 2011). Our review is de novo, and we will affirm the judgment only if there is no genuine issue of material fact and the evidence entitles the moving party to judgment as a matter of law. Id. Generally that means that if opposing parties present contradictory evidence about a material fact, summary judgment is not proper because questions of credibility are resolved by the finder of fact. See Samm v. Martin , 940 A.2d 138, 141 (D.C. 2007). The usual resort to the factfinder is not necessary, however, and summary judgment is proper, "[w]hen opposing parties tell two different stories, one of which is blatantly contradicted by the record, so that no reasonable jury could believe it." Scott v. Harris , 550 U.S. 372, 380, 127 S.Ct. 1769, 167 L.Ed.2d 686 (2007). Evidence satisfying this "rarely" met standard includes "a video tape that ‘quite clearly’ demonstrates the falsity of [a] statement." Robinson v. Pezzat , 818 F.3d 1, 10 (D.C. Cir. 2016) (quoting Scott , 550 U.S. at 378, 127 S.Ct. 1769 ); see also, e.g. , Franklin v. Blackman , No. 13-CV-470, 2014 WL 6685950, at *6 (N.D. Ill. Nov. 25, 2014)...
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