Walczak v. Chi. Bd. of Educ.

• Decision Date: 10 January 2014
• Docket Number: No. 12–2808.,12–2808.
• Citation: 739 F.3d 1013
• Parties: Harriet WALCZAK, Plaintiff–Appellant, v. CHICAGO BOARD OF EDUCATION, Defendant–Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

739 F.3d 1013

Harriet WALCZAK, Plaintiff–Appellant,

v.CHICAGO BOARD OF EDUCATION, Defendant–Appellee.

No. 12–2808.

United States Court of Appeals,Seventh Circuit.

Argued Feb. 13, 2013.

Decided Jan. 10, 2014.

Ruth I. Major, Attorney, Law Offices of Ruth I. Major, PC, Chicago, IL, for Plaintiff–Appellant.

Tara M. Grimm, Attorney, Chicago Board of Education Law Department, Chicago, IL, for Defendant–Appellee.

Before BAUER, SYKES, and HAMILTON, Circuit Judges.

SYKES, Circuit Judge.

Harriet Walczak was in her fourth decade of teaching in the Chicago Public School system when her school's new principal placed her in a performance-remediation program during the 2007–2008 academic year. By the end of that school year, she was facing discharge proceedings. Walczak thought that the principal had it in for her based on her age (she was in her late fifties when the new principal started in 2006), so she filed a charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”) alleging a violation of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (“ADEA”), 29 U.S.C. §§ 621 et seq.

While her EEOC charge was pending, Walczak was initially successful in the discharge proceedings: The hearing officer assigned to her case recommended that Walczak be reinstated as a tenured teacher. But the Chicago Board of Education rejected the hearing officer's recommendation and terminated her employment. Walczak filed a complaint in Cook County Circuit Court seeking judicial review of the Board's decision, arguing that it was unlawful under the Illinois School Code and that the Board had violated her right to due process. The circuit court affirmed the Board's decision, and the Illinois Appellate Court recently affirmed that judgment.

Shortly after the circuit court's decision, Walczak received a right-to-sue letter from the EEOC. She then sued the Board in federal court alleging that she was discharged because of her age in violation of the ADEA, 29 U.S.C. § 623(a)(1). The Board moved to dismiss, arguing that Walczak's ADEA claim was precluded because she could and should have included it in the state-court action. Walczak responded that the Board had acquiesced in her decision to split her claims between the two courts. The district court disagreed and dismissed the ADEA suit on the basis of preclusion.

We affirm. Walczak could have brought her ADEA claim in conjunction with her state-court suit for judicial review of the Board's decision to terminate her employment. See Dookeran v. County of Cook, 719 F.3d 570, 577 (7th Cir.2013); Garcia v. Village of Mount Prospect, 360 F.3d 630, 644 (7th Cir.2004); Blount v. Stroud, 232 Ill.2d 302, 328 Ill.Dec. 239, 904 N.E.2d 1, 17 (2009). Her argument that applying claim preclusion would be inequitable is unpersuasive. The Board did not acquiesce to claim-splitting. To the contrary, the Board raised its preclusion defense as soon as Walczak brought her ADEA claim in the second suit. Because no exception removes Walczak's situation from the general rule against claim-splitting, the district court correctly held that her ADEA suit was precluded.

I. Background

Walczak was hired as a teacher in the Chicago Public School system in 1970. She obtained tenure and taught continuously in the district through the 2007–2008 school year. In 1993 Walczak began teaching at Wells Community Academy High School. At the start of the 2006–2007 academic year, a new principal took over at Wells. Walczak alleges that the new principal was disdainful of the older teachers from the outset, calling them “dinosaurs” in front of both faculty and students.

The following school year the principal placed Walczak in a performance-remediation program. Among other aspects of the program, the principal assigned a mentor, but Walczak found the mentor ill-equipped to provide guidance. Walczak's complaint identifies several other ways in which the principal treated her differently than the younger teachers, including frequently interrupting her classes during the remediation period. She claims that the principal was trying to “force [her] out.”

In May 2008 the principal issued an evaluation of Walczak's performance indicating that she was not meeting expectations. A few days later the principal concluded that Walczak had failed to satisfactorily complete the remediation program and recommended that her employment as a tenured teacher not be renewed. On June 4, 2008, Walczak received a letter stating that she'd been “reassigned to the Area Office,” and on June 12 she received a letter “discharg[ing her] from her tenured position.” The June 12 letter notified her of the “charges and specifications against her” and “stated that she would receive a hearing on the charges.”

In July 2008 Walczak filed a charge with the EEOC alleging age discrimination in violation of the ADEA. Meanwhile, Walczak's hearing on the principal's discharge determination did not take place until the spring and summer of 2009. On December 1, 2009, the hearing officer assigned to her case issued a 240–page report making extensive factual findings and recommending that Walczak be reinstated to her tenured position. In February 2010, however, the Board rejected the hearing officer's recommendation and terminated her employment. Walczak sought judicial review of the Board's decision in Cook County Circuit Court, arguing that the Board violated both the Illinois School Code, see105 Ill. Comp. Stat.. 5/34–83 to –85c, and her right to due process. In June 2011 the circuit court upheld the Board's decision. Walczak appealed to the Illinois Appellate Court, and on September 30, 2013, the appellate court affirmed. See Walczak v. Bd. of Educ., 2013 IL App (1st) 111972–U, 2013 WL 5493695 (Ill.App.Ct. Sept. 30, 2013).

On August 25, 2011—two months after the circuit court upheld the Board's decision and more than three years after Walczak filed her EEOC charge—the EEOC issued a right-to-sue letter notifying Walczak that it had ceased processing her charge and she had 90 days to file suit. In November 2011 Walczak sued the Board in federal court alleging age discrimination in violation of the ADEA, 29 U.S.C. § 623(a)(1). The Board moved to dismiss, arguing that claim preclusion ¹ barred the ADEA suit because it arose out of the same set of facts as the action in Cook County Circuit Court.

Walczak responded with several arguments against preclusion: (1) there was no final decision with preclusive effect; (2) the Board acquiesced to the splitting of her claims between state and federal court; (3) she did not have a full and fair opportunity to litigate her claims; and (4) applying claim preclusion would be inequitable and would not advance the doctrine's purposes. The district court rejected Walczak's arguments and granted the Board's motion to dismiss. This appeal followed.

II. Discussion

The district court dismissed Walczak's complaint under Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure for failure to state a claim, ² so our review is de novo. Dookeran, 719 F.3d at 575. The preclusion rules of Illinois apply; the Full Faith and Credit Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1738, “requires federal courts to give the same preclusive effect to state court judgments that those judgments would be given in the courts of the State from which the judgments emerged.” Kremer v. Chem. Const. Corp., 456 U.S. 461, 466, 102 S.Ct. 1883, 72 L.Ed.2d 262 (1982); see also Dookeran, 719 F.3d at 575.

The doctrine of claim preclusion “provides that a final judgment on the merits rendered by a court of competent jurisdiction bars any subsequent actions between the same parties or their privies on the same cause of action.” Rein v. David A. Noyes & Co., 172 Ill.2d 325, 216 Ill.Dec. 642, 665 N.E.2d 1199, 1204 (1996). In Illinois the defense of claim preclusion has three prerequisites: (1) a final judgment on the merits rendered by a court of competent jurisdiction; (2) an identity of the causes of action; and (3) an identity of parties or their privies. Cooney v. Rossiter, 2012 IL 113227, ¶ 18, 369 Ill.Dec. 305, 986 N.E.2d 618, 621. The second element is assessed by reference to the “transactional test,” which provides that separate claims are considered the same cause of action for claim-preclusion purposes “ ‘if they arise from a single group of operative facts, regardless of whether they assert different theories of relief.’ ” Id. ¶ 21, 369 Ill.Dec. 305, 986 N.E.2d at 622 (quoting River Park, Inc. v. City of Highland Park, 184 Ill.2d 290, 234 Ill.Dec. 783, 703 N.E.2d 883, 893 (1998)). Claim preclusion applies not only to matters that were actually decided in the original action but also to matters that could have been decided. Id. ¶ 18, 369 Ill.Dec. 305, 986 N.E.2d at 621 (citing River Park, 234 Ill.Dec. 783, 703 N.E.2d at 889);contra Am. Family Mut. Ins. Co. v. Savickas, 193 Ill.2d 378, 250 Ill.Dec. 682, 739 N.E.2d 445, 451 (2000) (explaining that issue preclusion, or collateral estoppel, requires that “the party sought to be bound must actually have litigated the issue in the first suit” and must have had “a full and fair opportunity to present his case”).

Although Walczak contended in the district court that there was no final judgment that could bar her ADEA suit, the district court correctly concluded that the circuit court's decision in the judicial-review proceeding constitutes a final judgment on the merits. Walczak prudently doesn't challenge that conclusion on appeal. Similarly, Walczak no longer argues that it was unclear whether she could have joined her federal employment-discrimination claim with her complaint for judicial review in Cook County Circuit Court. In 2009 the Illinois Supreme Court clarified that the state circuit courts have jurisdiction over federal civil-rights claims. See Blount, 328 Ill.Dec. 239, 904 N.E.2d at 17. We have held that Illinois litigants seeking circuit-court review of administrative proceedings implicating events that also give rise to a federal civil-rights...