Trott v. H.D. Goodall Hosp.

• Decision Date: 21 March 2013
• Docket Number: Docket No. Yor–12–213.
• Citation: Trott v. H.D. Goodall Hosp., 2013 ME 33, 66 A.3d 7 (Me. 2013)
• Parties: Claire TROTT v. H.D. GOODALL HOSPITAL.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

66 A.3d 7

2013 ME 33

Claire TROTT

v.H.D. GOODALL HOSPITAL.

Docket No. Yor–12–213.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Argued: Dec. 12, 2012.

Decided: March 21, 2013.

Guy D. Loranger, Esq.(orally), Nichols, Webb & Loranger, P.A., Saco, for appellantClaire Trott.

Katharine I. Rand, Esq.(orally), and Michelle Y. Bush, Esq., Pierce Atwood LLP, Portland, for appelleeH.D. Goodall Hospital.

Panel: SAUFLEY, C.J., and ALEXANDER, LEVY, SILVER, MEAD, GORMAN, and JABAR, JJ.

Majority: SAUFLEY, C.J., and ALEXANDER, LEVY, SILVER, MEAD, GORMAN, and JABAR, JJ.

Concurring: SILVER, and JABAR, JJ.

LEVY, J.

[¶ 1]Claire Trott appeals from the Superior Court's (York County, Fritzsche, J.) grant of a summary judgment in favor of her former employer, H.D. Goodall Hospital, on Trott's claim that the Hospital violated section 833(1)(C) of Maine's Whistleblowers' Protection Act (WPA),26 M.R.S. §§ 831–840(2012), when it discharged her for participating in a deposition in connection with a wrongful death lawsuit against the Hospital.The Hospital contends that it discharged Trott based on misconduct to which she admitted during the deposition, not her participation in the deposition.Because we conclude that Trott presented sufficient evidence to create a genuine issue of material fact, we vacate the judgment.

I.BACKGROUND

[¶ 2] The following facts are supported by the summary judgment record and presented in the light most favorable to Trott, as the nonprevailing party.SeeDaniels v. Narraguagus Bay Health Care Facility,2012 ME 80, ¶ 2, 45 A.3d 722.

[¶ 3] The Hospital employed Trott as a nurse for approximately nineteen years.Between 1998 and 2007, the Hospital's performance evaluations of Trott were consistently positive.

[¶ 4] In December 2007, a patient died during Trott's shift.¹After the patient's death, Trott spoke with the deceased patient's daughter and speculated as to possible causes of death, including morphine overdose.The patient's estate initiated a wrongful death lawsuit against the Hospital.

[¶ 5] The following October, the Hospital gave Trott her annual performance evaluation, which awarded Trott a 1.5 percent raise and advised her that she needed improvement in the areas of documentation and medication administration.In January 2009, the Hospital reevaluated Trott and awarded her an additional 1.5 percent raise for satisfactory improvement in those areas.

[¶ 6] A month after Trott's positive reevaluation, she was deposed in connection with the wrongful death lawsuit against the Hospital.During Trott's preparation for the deposition, the Hospital's attorney told Trott that she was to blame for the lawsuit because she had indicated to the patient's daughter that the Hospital might be responsible for the patient's death due to a morphine overdose.

[¶ 7] During the deposition, the attorney for the deceased patient's estate asked Trott about her care of the patient in the hours leading up to the patient's death.Trott testified that during her rounds, she had observed the patient “sound asleep,” and that she had intended to enter that information in the patient's computerized medical record.Following this testimony, the attorney presented Trott with a copy of the patient's medical record, which showed that Trott had entered in the record that the patient was “alert, oriented times three” and had an “unsteady gait.”

[¶ 8] The attorney asked Trott to explain the discrepancy between her observation of the patient and the medical record entry.This was the first time Trott had been shown the discrepancy.Trott responded, “see, this electronic thing is new to me, so, in my opinion, I was—I know [the patient] and I know he is alerted and oriented normally, and I was going—I was doing the assessment according to that, not—I don't know what you're—I don't know how to explain it.”When pressed as to how she could have known that the patient was alert and had an unsteady gait when the patient was, in fact, sleeping, Trott explained that she made the medical record entry based on her earlier observations of the patient while the two attended church.Trott now contends that she offered the church explanation at the 2009 deposition because she did not know how else to explain the discrepancy, and that the real reason for the improper medical record entry may have been that she accidentally entered the wrong information into the system.

[¶ 9] Some Hospital administrators told Trott that they knew she had not done it on purpose, meaning that she did not do it deliberately.Nevertheless, on March 26, 2009, a day after Trott signed her deposition transcript, the Hospital sent Trott a letter formally terminating her employment on the ground that the medical record entry Trott described in her deposition constituted a “[f]alsification of a patient medical record,” which is a terminable offense within the meaning of the Hospital's Conduct and Discipline policy.²As required by law, the Hospital reported the discharge to the Maine State Board of Nursing.The Hospital's letter to the Board cited additional bases for its decision to discharge Trott, including her alleged incompetence with regard to documentation and medication administration.

[¶ 10] Trott filed a complaint against the Hospital, alleging that it violated 26 M.R.S. § 833(1)(C) because it discharged her in retaliation for her deposition testimony in the wrongful death lawsuit against the Hospital.The Hospital moved for summary judgment based on its contention that it discharged Trott because she falsified a patient's medical record.The court granted summary judgment because it concluded that Trott did not meet her burden to produce evidence that the Hospital discharged her because of her participation in the deposition.This appeal followed.

II.DISCUSSION

[¶ 11] When an employer discriminates against an employee for being requested to participate in a court action, the Maine Human Rights Act provides the employee with a cause of action against the employer.³See5 M.R.S. §§ 4572(1)(A),4621 (2012);26 M.R.S. § 833(1)(C).⁴To prevail on this claim, an employee must prove three elements: (1) the employee was requested to participate in a court action, (2) the employer subjected the employee to an adverse employment action, and (3) there was a “causal link” between being requested to participate in a court action and the adverse employment action.See26 M.R.S. § 833(1)(C);Costain v. Sunbury Primary Care, P.A.,2008 ME 142, ¶ 6, 954 A.2d 1051.Thus, we will affirm the grant of summary judgment against Trott only if she failed to meet her burden of production on any of these three elements.⁵Because the Hospital properly concedes that Trott's discharge is an adverse employment action, we focus on whether Trott met her burden to produce evidence that (A)she was requested to participate in a court action, and (B) a causal link exists between Trott's participation in the court action and her discharge.

A. Trott's Participation in a Court Action

[¶ 12]Section 833(1)(C) prohibits an employer from discharging an employee because “[t]he employee is requested to participate in ... a court action.”26 M.R.S. § 833(1)(C).A deposition is a “court action” within the meaning of the WPA because depositions are an integral part of the litigation process and are subject to Maine's CourtRules. SeeM.R. Civ. P. 32;see alsoHenry v. City of Detroit,234 Mich.App. 405, 594 N.W.2d 107, 110–12(1999)(construing“court action” in a nearly identical provision of the Michigan WPA to include depositions).

[¶ 13] The unambiguous language of section 833(1)(C) protects the employee from discrimination based on the employee's requested participation in a deposition.It does not prevent an employer from taking an adverse employment action against an employee based on the content of the employee's deposition testimony.Section 833(1)(C) need not protect employees from discrimination based on deposition testimony that “blows the whistle” on an employer's illegal or unsafe practices, because other subsections of section 833(1) serve that function.See26 M.R.S. § 833(1)(A), (B), (E).⁶Furthermore, by not protecting deposition content, section 833(1)(C) prevents employees from immunizing themselves against an employer's response to the employee's unacceptable behavior by simply testifying to that behavior during the course of a deposition.Thus, the limited applicability of section 833(1)(C) allows section 833(1) as a whole to prevent unlawful whistleblower retaliation by an employer while also preserving an employer's right to discharge an employee at will.

[¶ 14] Therefore, to the extent that the content of Trott's testimony alerted the Hospital to lawful grounds for Trott's discharge, section 833(1)(C) did not make it unlawful for the Hospital to discharge Trott on those grounds.⁷However, to the extent that the Hospital discharged Trott because of her participation in the deposition, the discharge is unlawful pursuant to section 833(1)(C).We thus turn to the question of whether Trott presented sufficient evidence to withstand summary judgment on the issue of whether there was a causal link between her participation in the deposition and her discharge.SeeCostain,2008 ME 142, ¶ 6, 954 A.2d 1051;Doyle v. Dep't of Human Servs.,2003 ME 61, ¶ 9, 824 A.2d 48.

B. Trott's Burden to Produce Evidence of a Causal Link between Her Participation in the Deposition and Her Discharge

[¶ 15]We review the grant of summary judgment on the issue of causation in an employment discrimination claim by applying the three-step, burden-shifting analysis articulated in McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green,411 U.S. 792, 802–05, 93 S.Ct. 1817, 36 L.Ed.2d 668(1973).SeeFuhrmann v. Staples the Office Superstore E., Inc.,2012 ME 135, ¶ 13, 58 A.3d 1083;Doyle,2003 ME 61, ¶ 14, 824 A.2d 48.Under that framework, (1) the employee bears the initial burden to produce evidence that unlawful discrimination motivated...