thank you your honor good morning may it please the court thank you for hearing argument in this case and i'm honored to be here the district court in our view gave insufficient feller ship one june second a twenty eleven the hospital stationery med star stationery and later when she arrived aug first the twenty eleven on the university stationery and the district court made no comment on the difference between these two in fact in a footnote the court suggested that perhaps the august one letter was simply an amendment to the june second letter but  it's important to us and importantly lieutenant colonel burns that both of these letters offer her the very same fellowship and these offer letters resulted in her beginning her fellowship and she was brought in and dr levy and dr nelson gave her a letter of april third of twenty twelve dismissing her and this is significant in the first sentences dismissing her from quote research fellowship agreement with georgetown university medical center and dismiss you from the community pediatrics and child advocacy fellowship program it's important to us to highlight those two different programs that are both identified in this initial dismissal letter actually given to lieutenant burns on april third two thousand and twelve because she subsequently in her fellowship and dr nelson exempted her fellowship and a letter of december eleventh of twenty twelve that we know was created by the until our intellectual offer of what we call the dual did the air force asked in a verification form sent out for the hospital to report by filling in some blanks one of which was whether she was the subject of any discipline to a starter levy answered yes and there had been a previous inquiry by both colonel rock and colonel tankersley asking for specific explanations as to why the terminations took place there was no sharing with them at any point in time but there were some sort of dual fellowship and now i'm going to do a fellowship what i'm trying to figure out here is the alleged harm is that  after she with there were the exchange of letters and she withdrew from the fellowship medstar sent a letter just air force that contained a final summit assessment yes but the air the hospital malices quintessentially a factual issue for determination by the jury and in this particular case the district  facts probably about one hundred sixteen that we presented to the district court in response to georgetown's assertion that everything that was contained in that summative assessment was true and that the record of the falsity of the information that was included bear that we made in the district court and so they feed that in our brief your honor of pardon me but we refer the court to that contest of material facts and the problem that your honor has now is that the district court didn't make any findings of fact on the particular components of the sum of the assessment but more importantly i didn't see  the explanation for that i suppose is that the argument that was made by georgetown was fairly benign and the court's treatment of it was fairly benign and the extensive nature of the contest over it went on for pages and pages and pages in the cross motions for an excuse me the motion for summary judgment and this court i think in fairness to the position that we took on behalf of lieutenant colonel byrd's this court is in the same it's important to understand that the some of the sussman has it least from the standpoint of the district courts assessment of the niceties of the legal documents here this is  than was dismissed because there had to be some relationship between med star and ten per burns if medstar has been right to report that she has been dismissed from the program to the hospital operates then how could there not be an obligation between best star and lieutenant colonel burns to treat her fairly to provide her with due process according to the accreditation council of graduate medical education to insist as our expert matthew blast indicated someone who's quite distinguished that there this area to assist that if you're going to do a summit of assessment at the end of the day then which you do during the course of the fellowship training must also comply with the a c g and the standards by giving lieutenant colonel burns intermediate feedback on her performance and an opportunity quite frankly to even have input into the some of the sas i'm quite surprised quite frankly that the district court judges quite experienced in medical education cases didn't recognise that dr blass these opinion about due process within the medical education program was so important in considering what the facts were in this case and what the standards were were determining the motion for summary judgment thank you when you're from the other side now telly but common interest privilege applies bores the definition claims that said they also argue that peer review statute of the district of columbia is an express policy of the district of columbia government and should apply first as a threshold because that's an expectation with a graduate medical education and then the statute in turn offers protections for those who participate in peer review because of the important public policy behind having accurate information about medical specialty and other i get that it's just it's it's a little different animal when you have someone the military send in someone for education in this part of their active duty that the prime party to this is actually the air force not dr burns  so it is their contract their fellowship that she's doing at their direction as part of her education and i'm trying to figure out whether you've seen prior cases involved active duty military graduate students and the transmission of information between the educators and the military which is itself the prime party to the contract i have in your honor but in the testimony that was taken from  the air force or air force officers they were tired by the time we they were the pows they talked about it as being a standard operating procedure for them to request from the training institution information about the officer candidate  partly that was because they they required for their better what occasion and partly it's because the officer is assigned to the eight at the airport institution for training so they're no longer under military supervision at the time when they're performing those services and getting that training so they want input from the institution for purposes of their documentation of their own internal record keeping you know the oddity here is i in the design assume your argument you're saying that her resignation  any obligation on your poor to afford her due process which doesn't seem to me you're otherwise contesting that she would have a new university settings lisa my experience there normally would be  sustenance that had not been going to pursuant to due process your honor there are two answers to that and it goes back to the fact that there were two institutions in ball one of which had a contractual agreement with dr burns and that was georgetown university that's the contract from which she resigned and whatever due process rights she has in that agreement first georgetown thinks we're satisfied because it had a right to dismiss or fairly or unfairly in terms of others view of due process but house officers manual and that includes those who are in training and in fact mates are offered dr burns to process and dr burns expert after the fact a process which is what their manual up dr burns expert admitted to this deposition the process offered by the med star met the applicable medical staff standards for the accreditation body that's a paid appendix face five fifty four paragraph one fifty five of the transcript cites reference megastars expert agreed and dr burns opted not to invoke that those in her relationship whatever its cameras characterized with med star terminate at the same moment her relationship with georgetown terminated or is your theory that they separately terminated your honor they were they were terminated at the same time that would have been at the april third meeting with dr burns where she was presented with the  that is the center of this case because medstar megastars position meaning that she had been terminated from her position within the clinical training program that operated had been covered by the initial letter prepared by georgetown and given to dr burns on april third when georgetown subsequently made a decision to allow dr byrd's to resign from her research fellowship agreement that did not include med star and m from the clinical we just said it was one fellowship she resigned from the one fellowship she didn't know that suddenly all right not suddenly say eight months later nine months after the april terminations that it was going to suddenly get divided into two with two different letters coming out with the very information she was trying to stop well she also didn't leave the program at george washington university there were components of her training that she was no i'm you kno whole she figured georgetown a med star with a unified whole in here that i thought you had just said to me and i'm sorry if i misunderstood that you yourself consider it a single fellowship and that when one terminated the other terminated it instantaneously and that's what th agreement say there was a research fellow ship agreement that dr burns entered into with georgetown university and which georgetown university had an understanding with which with her air force training command  and both of those agreements contemplated that dr burns would participate in a clinical program offered by bedsore as part of her research fellowship agreement with georgetown university some of them back georgetown turns to med star and says we have a fellow we would like you to put her into your training program through the children's clinic medstar does so it has an independent obligation as a as a as a training as a medical training facility to to have someone in that program subject to the rigors of academic medical training that's what the april through there were bodies or the  second april third letter represents is georgetown's notification or because you need meds stars notification that dr burns has not completed that program was never sent to anybody i have this great obligation to do when i would say back to your honor because it was essentially the same letter was issued it was written in december it dated a name it was signed in december with an april date i agree with that it was a not written by them did they just why did they write it honor the perspective that georgetown and bess are have on that is that each institution was was free to make a decision as it as george washington one of them with respect to dr burns position with  is the letter that is issues of dr burns the original letter in april which is given to her real time references both the b the georgetown research fellowship agreement and the program in which dr burns was placed by georgetown with the consent of medstar so it's dismissing europe from both of those at the same time to the point where georgetown the sides it's going to allow dr burns to resign from the research fellowship agreement that leaves in place because she didn't know anything she did not ask for the release she she consciously phrased her letter was her testimony to match the description in her research fellowship agreement with georgetown which  that well the greenman least terminates when the arrangement between the university and the fellow terminates for any reason i think that's right expressed agreement to the contrary upon a terminations arrangement from the university in the fellow and so there was no express agreement to the contrary that the men star one would go forward in any way so it was rising or falling and information in it as was in the the terminations letter the notice letter to dr burns that we acknowledge was never delivered to her even though it was essentially the same facts that were in the april the original label third letter which was reference that her letter went to three i thoroughly enjoyed providing clinical here to pediatric patients that the kids mobile medical clinic the pleasure to do all this but i've got to move on but that's not what she has to be released from here on in that she asked to be released from her her arrangement with with georgetown and with her mind allen ship from her one fellowship from from a fellowship which included a training employee she was not wrong she was a georgetown university employee and in the end she that is the georgetown employee agreement that she had with med store it was to allow her to tha removal that was initiated on april third actually april third that she resigned from her resignation was accepted now all they kept secret and you're talking about the december third letter no i'm talking about the real april third letter which refers to both programs m he just said that by this letter she was dismissed from both sides of the fellowship the clinical and the academic side of the fellowship but they kept secret from her the idea that position that when lieutenant colonel burns said in her letter resigning as a consequence of being said the real april third letter that constituted a resignation from a fellowship and all of its components and what mr sure is open court is that secretly georgetown apparently was harboring an intention at accepting her resignation except they kept it in their pockets and backdated it that's the height of perfidy in my view and it's summarized in our exhibit fifty eight