Wyss v. General Dynamics Corp.

• Decision Date: 07 October 1998
• Docket Number: No. 96-0539L.,96-0539L.
• Citation: 24 F.Supp.2d 202
• Parties: Cynthia WYSS, Plaintiff, v. GENERAL DYNAMICS CORPORATION, General Dynamics Corporation's Electric Boat Division's Health Insurance Plan, Doug Poole, Individually and in his capacity as Foreman of Electrical Shop # 903, and Paul Jeffrey, Individually and in his capacity as Supervisor of Electrical Shop # 903, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Rhode Island

24 F.Supp.2d 202

Cynthia WYSS, Plaintiff, v. GENERAL DYNAMICS CORPORATION, General Dynamics Corporation's Electric Boat Division's Health Insurance Plan, Doug Poole, Individually and in his capacity as Foreman of Electrical Shop # 903, and Paul Jeffrey, Individually and in his capacity as Supervisor of Electrical Shop # 903, Defendants.

No. 96-0539L.

United States District Court, D. Rhode Island.

October 7, 1998.

Matthew J. Brier, Pawtucket, RI, for plaintiff.

Rodger W. Lehr, Jr., General Dynamics Corp., Groton, CT, Neal J. McNamara, Providence, RI, for defendants.

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

LAGUEUX, Chief Judge.

In this case, plaintiff, Cynthia Wyss, alleges sexual harassment and retaliation against her employer, General Dynamics Corporation ("General Dynamics"), her immediate supervisor, Paul Jeffrey ("Jeffrey"), and his supervisor Doug Poole ("Poole").

She brings suit under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 ("Title VII"), 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000e et seq. (1994), the Rhode Island Fair Employment Practices Act ("FEPA"), R.I.Gen.Laws §§ 28-5-1 et seq. (1995), the Rhode Island Civil Rights Act ("RICRA"), R.I.Gen.Laws §§ 42-112-1 to -2 (1993), and the Employment Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 ("ERISA"), 29 U.S.C. §§ 1001 et seq. (1994).

The only matter presently before this Court is the motion of Jeffrey and Poole to dismiss pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. They petition the Court to dismiss as to them Counts I and II of the Complaint alleging discrimination on the basis of sex and retaliation under Title VII, FEPA, and RICRA, on the ground that those statutes do not provide for individual liability by supervisory employees who have indulged in discriminatory conduct toward subordinates.

DISCUSSION

I. Legal Standard for Motion to Dismiss

In ruling on a motion to dismiss, the Court construes the complaint in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, taking all well-pleaded allegations as true and giving the plaintiff the benefit of all reasonable inferences. See Negron-Gaztambide v. Hernandez-Torres, 35 F.3d 25, 27 (1st Cir.1994), cert. denied, 513 U.S. 1149, 115 S.Ct. 1098, 130 L.Ed.2d 1066 (1995). Dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6) is appropriate only if "it appears beyond doubt that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitle him to relief." Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-46, 78 S.Ct. 99, 102, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957); see also 5A Charles Wright & Arthur Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1357 (2d ed.1990).

II. Individual Liability of Defendants Jeffrey and Poole

At issue is whether defendants Jeffrey and Poole can be held personally liable under Title VII, FEPA and RICRA. This writer decided these issues in favor of individual liability in Iacampo v. Hasbro Inc., 929 F.Supp. 562 (D.R.I.1996). This Court took this motion under advisement to gauge whether the case law has evolved in such a way that Iacampo is no longer good law in this district. The number of cases opposed to individual liability has multiplied, but the analysis has not evolved. The intervening cases offer no new rationale or doctrine. For the reasons stated in Iacampo and for additional reasons outlined below, this Court concludes that defendants Jeffrey and Poole are subject to personal liability under all three statutes.

A. Title VII

It is unlawful under Title VII for an employer "to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise to discriminate against any individual ... because of such individual's race, color, religion, sex, or national origin." 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(a)(1). Under Title VII, "a person engaged in an industry affecting commerce who has fifteen or more employees for each working day in each of twenty or more calendar weeks in the current or preceding calendar year, and any agent of such a person" qualifies as an employer. Id. § 2000e(b) (emphasis added). Case law defines an agent "as any employee exercising supervisory power or control within a company." Iacampo, 929 F.Supp. at 571 (citing Showalter v. Allison Reed Group, Inc., 767 F.Supp. 1205, 1210-11 (D.R.I.1991)); see Paroline v. Unisys Corp., 879 F.2d 100, 104 (4th Cir.1989), rev'd in part, aff'd. in part, 900 F.2d 27 (4th Cir. 1990).

The query before the Court is whether Title VII allows supervisors and other individuals to escape liability for their own discriminatory acts. Certainly, Title VII places respondeat superior liability on an employer for the acts of his or her agent, but the issue remains whether the agent can be held jointly and severally liable for the agent's own discrimination. The First Circuit has not ruled on this issue, see Serapion v. Martinez, 119 F.3d 982, 992 (1st Cir.1997), cert denied, ___ U.S. ___, 118 S.Ct. 690, 139 L.Ed.2d 636 (1998),¹ and this circuit's district courts have split on the issue, see Iacampo, 929 F.Supp. at 571-72 (collecting decisions). However, in recent years, the majority of circuits has agreed with defendants in this case that Congress did not intend individual liability under Title VII and analogous statutes.²

Recognizing these recent cases, this Court, nevertheless, adheres to the holding in Iacampo. In deciding Iacampo, this Court took guidance from Judge Parker's dissent in Tomka v. Seiler Corp., 66 F.3d 1295, 1318-24 (2d Cir.1995) (Parker, J., dissenting), which is the best reasoned and most comprehensive opinion written on this subject. Accordingly, this Court reiterates the views set forth in the Tomka dissent and in Iacampo, but in greater detail.

1. Courts should look to a statute's language

Courts must rely on the language of statutes passed by Congress. Both the Supreme Court and the First Circuit have emphasized this limited role.

In a statutory construction case, the beginning point must be the language of the statute, and when a statute speaks with clarity to an issue judicial inquiry into the statute's meaning, in all but the most extraordinary circumstance, is finished.

Estate of Cowart v. Nicklos Drilling Co., 505 U.S. 469, 475, 112 S.Ct. 2589, 2594, 120 L.Ed.2d 379 (1992); accord Metropolitan Stevedore Co. v. Rambo, 515 U.S. 291, 295, 115 S.Ct. 2144, 2147, 132 L.Ed.2d 226 (1995); Hogan v. Bangor & Aroostook RR. Co., 61 F.3d 1034, 1037 (1st Cir.1995); Riva v. Massachusetts, 61 F.3d 1003, 1007 (1st Cir.1995). "This long-standing view of statutory construction is grounded upon a jurisprudential interest in the separation of federal powers under the Constitution." Tomka, 66 F.3d at 1319 (Parker, J., dissenting).

This interest is so strong that the Supreme Court has consistently limited deviations from the plain meaning of language to the "rare cases [in which] the literal application of a statute will produce a result demonstrably at odds with the intentions of its drafters." United States v. Ron Pair Enter. Inc., 489 U.S. 235, 242, 109 S.Ct. 1026, 1031, 103 L.Ed.2d 290 (1989) (quoting Griffin v. Oceanic Contractors, Inc., 458 U.S. 564, 571, 102 S.Ct. 3245, 3250, 73 L.Ed.2d 973 (1982)); accord In re Bajgar, 104 F.3d 495, 497-98 (1st Cir.1997); United States v. Flores, 968 F.2d 1366, 1370 (1st Cir.1992). "In such cases, the intention of the drafters, rather than the strict language, controls." Ron Pair Enter., 489 U.S. at 242, 109 S.Ct. 1026; accord Crooks v. Harrelson, 282 U.S. 55, 59-60, 51 S.Ct. 49, 50-51, 75 L.Ed. 156 (1930) (noting that deviation from plain reading should be made in "rare and exceptional circumstances" and requiring that "there must be something to make plain the intent of Congress that the letter of the statute is not to prevail").

The statute's language need not be the perfect expression of every Congressional intent. It need only be consistent with one of the policies that motivated Congress, as the Supreme Court has said in a case about severance payments to corporate employees about to join the government:

It is not our function to express either approval or disapproval of this kind of unconditional severance payment. We note only that a literal reading of the statute — which places a pre-Government service severance payment outside of the coverage of § 209(a) — is consistent with one of the policies that motivated the enactment of the statute.

Crandon v. United States, 494 U.S. 152, 168, 110 S.Ct. 997, 1006, 108 L.Ed.2d 132 (1990) (emphasis added). The facts of Crandon illuminate the Supreme Court's view of when these "rare and exceptional circumstances" have occurred.

Crandon overturned convictions of three former Boeing executives who received lump payments from the company to encourage them to leave their jobs to enter the federal executive branch. Federal law prohibited outside payments to federal employees, but the statute's literal reading limited criminal penalties to defendants who had been federal employees when the payment was made. The Supreme Court said the severance payments had a "somewhat nebulous character." Id. at 167, 110 S.Ct. at 1006. On the one hand, the Crandon Court noted, the Boeing payments certainly violated the rule against the appearance of conflicts of interest that had been one of the statutes' concerns. See id. at 167-68, 110 S.Ct. at 1006. But on the other hand, they did encourage qualified employees to offer their services to the federal government, a policy that both President John F. Kennedy and Attorney General Robert Kennedy had promoted at the time the law was drafted. See id. at 168, 110 S.Ct. at 1006. The plain language controlled because it was consistent with even a single policy that motivated the enactment of the statute. See id.; accord Crooks, 282 U.S. at 60, 51 S.Ct. at 50-51.

Thus, a court should recognize that such deviations should be rare. They should occur where the statute's literal reading conflicts with itself or where there is demonstrable evidence that the literal reading is entirely at odds with the drafters' intentions.

In this case, the statute is unambiguous and there is neither an internal...