Wallace v. Methodist Hospital System

• Decision Date: 07 November 2001
• Docket Number: No. 00-20255,00-20255
• Citation: 271 F.3d 212
• Parties: (5th Cir. 2001) VERONICA A. WALLACE, Plaintiff - Appellant, v. THE METHODIST HOSPITAL SYSTEM, Defendant - Appellee
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

Page 212

271 F.3d 212 (5th Cir. 2001)

VERONICA A. WALLACE, Plaintiff - Appellant, v. THE METHODIST HOSPITAL SYSTEM, Defendant - Appellee.

No. 00-20255

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS,

FIFTH CIRCUIT

November 7, 2001

[Copyrighted Material Omitted]

[Copyrighted Material Omitted]

Appeal from the United States District Court For the Southern District of Texas

Before EMILIO M. GARZA and PARKER, Circuit Judges, and HINOJOSA^*, District Judge.

EMILIO M. GARZA, Circuit Judge:

Veronica A. Wallace ("Wallace") appeals the district court's grant of judgment as a matter of law to the defendant, The Methodist Hospital System ("Methodist"), on her Title VII¹ and Texas Commission on Human Rights Act (TCHRA)² claims of sex discrimination. We affirm.

I

Wallace began working at Methodist in 1986 as a technician, but in 1990, she entered nursing school.³ While she was in nursing school, Donna Hahus ("Hahus"), the head nurse of Methodist's Medical Intensive Care Unit (MICU), hired Wallace as a student nurse. In the fall of 1992, soon after Wallace completed her nursing degree and became a Registered Nurse, Hahus hired Wallace as a staff nurse in the MICU. At the time she was hired, Wallace was pregnant with her first child. During the spring of 1993, Wallace took three-and-a-half months' maternity leave. By using accrued sick time, holiday time, and vacation time, Wallace received full pay and benefits throughout this leave.

Wallace returned to work in June. Shortly after returning to work, Wallace discovered that she was pregnant with her second child. Wallace switched her schedule from days to nights and began working a compressed schedule, putting in three twelve-hour shifts each week instead of five eight-hour shifts. Wallace testified that on her return, Hahus treated her differently. Specifically, when Hahus came on her shift and Wallace was finishing her shift, Hahus did not converse with Wallace when she entered a room to check a patient's chart. However, Martine Rousseau-Merzile, a nurse who was not pregnant during her employ in the MICU, testified that this was how Hahus treated her, i.e., she would just go about her business looking at the charts without speaking.

Just before Wallace left on her second maternity leave, Hahus and Tory Schmitz ("Schmitz"), Wallace's direct supervisor, met with Wallace to give her an evaluation. Wallace received a satisfactory rating and a merit increase as a result of this appraisal. Nonetheless, the evaluation contained written comments criticizing Wallace for "an impression that she is unconcerned with errors and omissions" and her overall score dropped ten points from the previous year when she was also pregnant. The evaluation noted that Wallace had been working the compressed schedule since returning from maternity leave. During this meeting, Hahus remarked to Wallace that she needed to "choose between nursing and family." Additionally, Schmitz told Wallace that she was unsure "how to classify [Wallace] because [she was] gone three months before and [she would be] gone three months again."

From March 2, 1994 through June 4, 1994, Wallace took her second maternity leave. Unlike her first maternity leave, Wallace had little accumulated time on which to draw, leaving a portion of her leave unpaid. With Hahus's assistance, however, Wallace increased the paid portion of her leave. Hahus listed enough days of Wallace's leave as excused absences to allow Wallace to accrue an additional four weeks of paid vacation time, which Wallace applied to her leave.

Within a month of returning to work after her second leave, Wallace learned that she was pregnant with her third child. Wallace testified that Hahus mentioned the availability of the compressed schedule to a group of nurses. Wallace stated her preference for this schedule. Hahus retorted that Wallace was "still costing the hospital money because [she] was receiving full benefits and giving 80 hour pay periods." Hahus, however, had no control over whether nurses worked a compressed schedule because it was part of a program Methodist offered to its employees. Wallace resumed working a compressed schedule.

Sometime prior to when she was slated to take her third maternity leave, Hahus chastised Wallace for following a physician's order literally, exclaiming "How stupid could you be?" A physician had issued an order to draw blood to ascertain the digoxin level of a patient to whom Wallace had just administered digoxin. Wallace knew that drawing the blood so close in time to the drug's administration would result in a false high and so she attempted to locate the physician giving the order. Learning that he had already left for the day, Wallace drew the blood. Hahus received the test results, which she realized registered a false high because of the close proximity of the draw and the administration.

On December 19, 1994, Dr. Barrosa, a gastroenterologist, issued a written order for tube feeding to begin on Mr. B.,⁴ a patient in the MICU.⁵ Under the order of Mr. B's attending physician, Dr. Kenneth Lloyd, Mr. B already had in place a Salem Sump, a large bore tube used for suctioning fluids from the stomach but which could also be used for tube feeding. Wallace knew that the Salem Sump could be used for feeding. Without an order to do so, even though one was required,⁶ Wallace replaced the Salem Sump with a feeding tube of a smaller diameter. She also wrote in the patient's record that she had received a verbal order from Dr. Nicola Hanania to put in the smaller bore tube.⁷Dr. Lloyd discovered that the Salem Sump had been replaced. He did not want the Salem Sump removed because of Mr. B's medical problems. After checking the chart and seeing the order with Dr. Hanania's name affixed, Dr. Lloyd asked Dr. Hanania why he had ordered the tube change. Dr. Hanania informed Dr. Lloyd that he had given no such order. Dr. Lloyd then spoke with Wallace. At trial, Wallace admitted that she could have but did not contact a physician about Dr. Barrosa's order.

The next day, Dr. Lloyd told Schmitz about the incident. Schmitz spoke to both Dr. Hanania and Dr. Barrosa, verifying that neither had given an order to change the tube. Dr. Barrosa testified that he did not want the Salem Sump changed. At the direction of Hahus, Schmitz called Wallace at home to inquire about the incident. Wallace admitted to Schmitz that she had inserted the tube without an order and had written that she had received a verbal order without having received one. Additionally, Wallace stated to Schmitz that she "wouldn't do it again." Schmitz related to Hahus what Wallace told her. Hahus verified with Dr. Hanania that he had not given the verbal order as Wallace had written. Hahus also discussed the incident with Marcella Louis, a nursing director and chairman of the peer review committee, Paula Hansen ("Hansen"), another nursing director and Hahus's supervisor, and Dr. Davies, the medical director of Methodist. Hansen, who was not aware that Wallace was pregnant, agreed that termination was the appropriate course of action. Hansen then contacted Leslie Wagner ("Wagner") in the Human Resources department. Hansen informed Wagner of the incident, and of Hansen's and Hahus's recommended course of action. Wagner agreed with the decision to terminate Wallace.

On December 21, 1994, Hahus called Wallace and asked her to report to Hahus's office. At that meeting, Hahus informed Wallace that she was terminating her for falsifying a hospital record by writing a verbal order for a specific procedure and then implementing that procedure without a physician's knowledge or consent. Hahus further explained that these actions were "willful or illegal, unprofessional conduct or unethical conduct detrimental to patient care or to [Methodist]'s operations that result in neglect, abuse, or exploitation of any patient,"⁸ which constituted a "Class I Violation."⁹ At the time of her discharge, Wallace was one month away from taking her third maternity leave.

Wallace requested an informal grievance meeting as provided by Methodist policy. Wagner, Hahus, Hansen, and Schmitz were present at that meeting. Wallace again admitted that, without receiving a doctor's order, she wrote a verbal order in Mr. B's chart and she replaced the Salem Sump, inserting a smaller bore nasogastric tube. Wallace also admitted that there were physicians available from whom she could have obtained an order prior to writing the order and inserting the feeding tube. In her defense, Wallace contended generally that other nurses engaged in the same actions, but were not terminated. The termination was upheld.

Shortly after Wallace's termination, Pat Gaskin ("Gaskin"), another nurse in the MICU, overheard Shawn Forney, a clinical dietician in the MICU, ask Schmitz why Wallace had been terminated. Schmitz replied, "First of all, she's been pregnant three times in the last three years." Upon hearing Schmitz's reply, Gaskin walked away.

Wallace filed suit against Methodist, alleging that Wallace had been terminated because of her sex, i.e., her pregnancies, in violation of Title VII and the TCHR. In September of 1998, the case went to trial. The jury was unable to reach a verdict and the district court declared a mistrial. The district court held a second trial in December of 1998. At the close of Wallace's case and at the close of all the evidence, Methodist moved for a judgment as a matter of law (JMOL), pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 50. Both times the district court denied the motions. The jury returned a verdict for Wallace, awarding her $70,000 in compensatory damages and $437,500 in punitive damages. Methodist again moved for a JMOL. The district court granted the motion and dismissed the case with prejudice. Wallace filed a timely notice of appeal.

II

A

We review the district court's grant of JMOL de novo. See Ins. Co. of N. Am. v. Aberdeen Ins. Servs., 253 F.3d 878, 883 (5th Cir. 2001). JMOL is...