Stramaski v. Lawley

• Decision Date: 11 August 2022
• Docket Number: 20-20607
• Citation: 44 F.4th 318
• Parties: Eva Kristine STRAMASKI, Plaintiff—Appellee, v. Mark LAWLEY, Individually, Defendant—Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

44 F.4th 318

Eva Kristine STRAMASKI, Plaintiff—Appellee,

v.Mark LAWLEY, Individually, Defendant—Appellant.

No. 20-20607

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

FILED August 11, 2022

Adam S. Greenfield, Law Office of Cloutman & Greenfield, P.L.L.C., Dallas, TX, Kalandra Nicole Wheeler, Wiley Wheeler, P.C., Houston, TX, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Melinda Wetzel, Office of the Attorney General, General Litigation Division, Austin, TX, for Defendant-Appellant.

Before Elrod, Southwick, and Costa, Circuit Judges.

Leslie H. Southwick, Circuit Judge:

Eva Stramaski claims her employment was terminated in retaliation for complaining she was going to be paid late. She filed a complaint against a department head within the Texas A&M Engineering Station, Dr. Mark Lawley, in his individual capacity, alleging he violated the anti-retaliation provision of the Fair Labor Standards Act. Lawley moved to dismiss Stramaski's retaliation claim because the suit was barred by sovereign immunity, and in the alternative, that he was entitled to qualified immunity. The district court determined that neither immunity applied. We agree as to sovereign immunity but VACATE and REMAND as to qualified immunity.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

Eva Stramaski was employed as an Academic Advisor by Texas A&M University through the Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station ("TEES"). She had recently returned from leave due to a surgical procedure when, on January 30, 2019, a TEES employee informed Stramaski that she would not be paid on time unless she submitted a second doctor's note that would release her back to work. Stramaski requested the second note but also spoke with TEES's Associate Director of Human Resources, Nicole Pottberg, to ensure she would be paid on time. Pottberg told Stramaski that she would be timely paid.

The next day, Stramaski received an e-mail from a man named Huff (whom the record does not otherwise identify) informing her she would not be paid in full for five or six days, even though her pay was finalized. On February 1, Stramaski went to Huff's office on an unrelated matter and again addressed her payment schedule. She confirmed with him that she would not be paid for five or six days from then. Huff also confirmed this timeline with the Assistant Dean for Finance. After this confirmation, Stramaski informed Huff that "she needed to be paid on time, as it was her legal right."

Stramaski then went directly to Human Resources to speak with someone about her potentially late pay. She spoke with an employee who ensured her that her "check would be cut within a few hours, and that she would be paid on time." Stramaski was timely paid.

Soon after Stramaski received this check, Dr. Mark Lawley, head of the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering within TEES, entered Stramaski's office and told her she "was being aggressive with regard to being paid on time" and sent her home for the day. On February 13, Lawley issued Stramaski a coaching letter detailing allegations against her from August to September 2018. Stramaski submitted a memo disputing those allegations on February 20. Two weeks later, on March 7, 2019, Lawley terminated Stramaski's employment.

In January 2020, Stramaski filed suit against Lawley in the United States District Court, Southern District of Texas. Lawley was sued only in his individual capacity for an alleged violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act ("FLSA"). See 29 U.S.C. § 215(a)(3). Stramaski claimed she was wrongfully terminated in retaliation for complaining that she would not be timely paid for a particular pay period. She sought injunctive and declaratory relief as well as damages.

Lawley moved to dismiss Stramaski's claims under Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1) and 12(b)(6). He argued her suit was barred under the Eleventh Amendment and, in the alternative, that he was entitled to qualified immunity. The magistrate judge issued a report and recommendation on the motion. The district court adopted the magistrate judge's recommendation and granted Lawley's motion to dismiss the claims for injunctive and declaratory relief due to a lack of standing. The district court refused to dismiss the claims for damages, finding neither the Eleventh Amendment nor qualified immunity applied. Lawley timely appealed.

DISCUSSION

Denials of sovereign immunity and qualified immunity are both reviewed de novo. Corn v. Miss. Dep't of Pub. Safety , 954 F.3d 268, 273 (5th Cir. 2020) ; Morgan v. Swanson , 659 F.3d 359, 370 (5th Cir. 2011). Absent waiver, the immunity of a state from suit as signified by, but not fully expressed in, the Eleventh Amendment is a jurisdictional barrier. Corn , 954 F.3d at 274, 276. We therefore start by considering the Eleventh Amendment. After concluding that there is jurisdiction, we evaluate the applicability of qualified immunity to Stramaski's FLSA claim.

I. Eleventh Amendment

Lawley argues this suit is barred by the Eleventh Amendment because the state is the "real party in interest." See Pennhurst State Sch. & Hosp. v. Halderman , 465 U.S. 89, 101, 104 S.Ct. 900, 79 L.Ed.2d 67 (1984). He contends Stramaski's suit is only nominally against him in his individual capacity but in fact is against the state because all the relief Stramaski seeks will ultimately come from TEES, her state employer.

Generally, the Eleventh Amendment does not bar suits against governmental officials in their individual capacities, but "where the state is the real and substantial party in interest, the Eleventh Amendment may bar the suit." Modica v. Taylor , 465 F.3d 174, 183 (5th Cir. 2006). Whether the state is the real party in interest depends on the circumstances of the case. Id. We begin our analysis of the relevant circumstances by discussing one of our precedents involving a different but related statute — the Family and Medical Leave Act ("FMLA").

In Modica , we held that the definition of covered employers in the FMLA and the FLSA are "very similar." Id. at 186. We are one of several courts to hold that the term "employer" should be interpreted the same in both statutes. Id. at 186–87. Thus, because Congress "chose to make the definition of employer materially identical" in these two acts, the FMLA offers "the best guidance" to inform our analysis of the same terms in the FLSA. See id. at 196 (quotation marks and citation omitted).

Our Modica decision relied on the statutory definition of employer in the FMLA to conclude that the "plain language of the FMLA permits public employees to be held individually liable." Id. at 187. FMLA-covered employers include "any person who acts, directly or indirectly, in the interest of an employer to any of the employees of such employer." 29 U.S.C. § 2611(4)(A)(ii)(I). We explained that this language is straightforwardly read to allow public employees to be held individually liable so long as they "act[ ], directly or indirectly, in the interest of an employer." Modica , 465 F.3d at 184–86. Our conclusion necessarily followed that the state-employed supervisor who allegedly retaliated against Modica could be liable in her individual capacity under the FMLA. Id. at 187.

The FLSA's "employer" definition is nearly identical. It covers

any person acting directly or indirectly in the interest of an employer in relation to an employee and includes a public agency, but does not include any labor organization (other than when acting as an employer) or anyone acting in the capacity of officer or agent of such labor organization.

29 U.S.C. § 203(d). We thus interpret the FLSA as we have the FMLA. When a defendant employee was "acting directly or indirectly in the interest of an employer in relation to an employee," that defendant may be subject to liability in an individual capacity. See Modica , 465 F.3d at 186.

Before proceeding too far in addressing individual capacity suits under the FLSA, we need to inject some cautionary principles. The portion of the Modica opinion addressing FMLA liability dealt with a claim by an employee of a Texas state agency. See id. at 177–78. Among Modica's claims was one against agency Executive Director Humphrey for terminating her in alleged retaliation for seeking FMLA leave. Id. at 178. When considering defendant Humphrey's argument that the claim was actually against the state, we first cited one of our precedents in which we held that the FMLA claims in that suit brought by an employee of a Louisiana state agency were clearly against the state. Id. at 183 (citing Kazmier v. Widmann , 225 F.3d 519, 533 n.65 (5th Cir. 2000), abrogated on other grounds by Nevada Dep't of Hum. Res. v. Hibbs , 538 U.S. 721, 123 S.Ct. 1972, 155 L.Ed.2d 953 (2003) ). The entire analysis of why the suit was actually against the state was in a footnote, where we cited a Supreme Court decision in which a suit "nominally against an officer" was held actually to be against the state. Kazmier , 225 F.3d at 533 n.65 (quoting Pennhurst , 465 U.S. at 101, 104 S.Ct. 900 ). The Modica opinion did not distinguish Kazmier in any meaningful way, but we suggested two reasons not to apply it. See Modica , 465 F.3d at 183–87.

The first reason was that when deciding whether the Eleventh Amendment bars a suit because it is actually against a state, the circumstances of the case are determinative. Id. at 183. We discussed in a parenthetical the circumstances of another circuit's decision that led it to conclude that an FLSA suit, though brought against a state employee individually, was actually against the state. Id. (citing Luder v. Endicott , 253 F.3d 1020, 1024–25 (7th Cir. 2001) ). We summarized the other circuit's holding this way:

the state would be required to pay damages to the 145 plaintiffs and concluding that casting the suit, brought under the Fair Labor Standards Act, as one against the officers in their individual capacities was a "transparent[ ] effort at an end run around the Eleventh Amendment."

Id. (quoting Luder , 253 F.3d at 1024–25 ). The...