right our fourth case for this morning is harris against allen county board please the court i mean david plank appearing on behalf of the appellant to carlton terrace the district court erred in finding that there was no genuine issue of material fact with respect to whether i'm sorry i'm sorry procedurally this case is a bit confusing i looked through the docket and it looks like it was a joint motion dismiss the superior court judge now why would harris agree to dismiss the entity that he admits was his direct employer why not at the very least sue both entities because mr harris also contends that the county was his employer and the superior case where a court has been challenge for something so the chief judge you know where to say you know from you know henceforth the the court is going to hire you know only white people you know to be judicial assistants the court can sued the chief judge could be sued for that you know that's a blatant violation of the constitution which applies to all of us and so mr harris has  a case that he would like to bring against his employer but his employers is the court now i think if you with that much you can go on explain to us how you know what your best case is for a contested characterization of the county board not just as is the mechanical issue or of checks and carrier out of orders from the court which is how they portray themselves but what is it that makes them in enough control over mr harrison's job and of control over his employment status to make him a joint employer yes your honor the purposes of federal anti discrimination statutes you need two things first you need evidence creating a genuine issue material for and that's why i'm asking you to tell me because you know we have murphy and your opponent say she was just a mouthpiece they actually literally use that word she's just conveying the messages back and forth about what's happening we have this somewhat ambiguous statement hearsay but  statement from chandra right car who says she didn't know that harris harris reports that she didn't know he'd been terminated and that she said that downtown meaning the county handles that that's murphy testified in her deposition that she spoke to miss riker and that miss riker told her that mr harris could not be accommodated and that he had to be terminated and so she says she was just acting as  to miss reichert's role she certainly you're right she doesn't say that she did do a particular thing but she also doesn't say that she didn't she just authenticate so then what we're left with your honor is the letter sent from charity murphy antone letter telling mr harris that he can't be accommodated and that he's going to be just that make her a decision is that enough evidence to show that either she or the solution maker with respect to that issue well there's nobody else that mr harris dealt with during this period of time regarding his accommodations return and work then miss murphy miss no i gree with you this murphy your honor told mr harris that your your your disability prevents you from returning to work and you were not qualified for any other jobs key she had applied for other jobs and she told me you're not qualified for those and she also altered that is that enough evidence is i really mean is i intend to ask the same question of the county is that enough evidence to say that she was the one who made that is vision or are we to take that as the county suggests that she's just passing along what she's been told it's it's enough to create a genuine issue material fact and that's the important point here is we were cut off at the knees and not allowed walk to take also isn't it in a true for example and throughout the state of indiana the employees of the judge are paid by the county that's true your honor and that the fact of him who he was paid  not the only person in the court system this paid by the state's a judge yes you are and that's not a major factor that we're relying on to establish the control what you need on the fact that he's paid by the county and that gets rid of a lot of your argument because you point to quite a few things  a letter head that has the county seal on it that given like judge kane is talking about it is that probative well the letterhead that the what what i think you're referring to there is his job description your honor and that doesn't have anything to do with payment that's his job description and it's a county job description and so that indicates that the county is not that wishing the duty well but the but the judge it is he's a judicial employ right right but the job description thinking it was no no miss harris it mr harris is alleging that the county is it has is an indirect employer under colony tomorrow and heine meyer because because there evidence from which an inference can be drawn that it through its miss murphy who is after all the eighty eight coordinator at least participated in this decision she's the only one there's there's any evidence that at all and mister morning laura mays there on behalf of the apple the apple e allen county indiana board of commissioners so here's what worries me about the county's position it certainly is possible that there be joint employers and what i'm trying to decide is whether there are enough just feuded issues of fact here about this arrangement whether it's the statements ms murphy made whether it's who creates the job description who decides what duties will be the county would contend that no they have not moved the ball into the field to have control over any of the duties first opposite and you know statute prescribe that these employees are employees of the court the statute general and discusses the creation of a juvenile center and states that employees of the juvenile center work at the pleasure of the court there is a separate statute that deals with allen county and it goes on to say that for example if there is no prescribed means of setting the salary then the court shall set the salary and it should be paid in the budget there are a few that are there no limit i mean if the court decided you know we we've been on a survival budget long long enough and so we're going to pay our youth care specialists two hundred thousand dollars a year because a tough job and they  need more money the county just mechanically pays that i believe there's a mechanism whereby the county council which is actually responsible for the budget they go into a mandate it goes badly go to a meeting i say i believe that so the court decided we've decided to build a new courthouse the county might say we don't think we have enough money for that understand to figure out one of the controls the county has over what the court says is it just the courts were period full stop or are there meaningful controls such that no harris in his case might have you know he certainly doesn't dispute that he works for the court but the only question is does he just the county have enough of a say in these things to make it a joint employer i think the county has very little say in that and the scenario that we've been discussing if there is some extraordinary fiscal issue then  budgets are set by the court and i believe the county council and not the county board of commissioners could object to what they might find to be and then reasonable budgetary assessment in which case the mandate would occur could be issued and that those parties would go to court but the board of commissioners in fact really no county entity has control over what goes on at the courts youth center or juvenile center in allen county other than the court the courts that's the duties if you know were represented by two separate attorneys i represent the county when the county decided to file a summary judgment on the issue of who is the proper employer and on the issue that it is not the proper employer the superior court was still in the case and had not yet been dismissed from the case and so the my belief is that the county or i'm sorry but the court folks were not really wanting to get too much into a lot of the facts of the case and so they're not those those individuals are not my clients when drafting affidavits for the summary judgment judge he did very unequivocal you say that it is the court that determines who is hired who is fired and that it has not delegated those duties to the county or to ms murphy and he said in fact that in this case the court me or that the county neither the county norma's murphy made the decision to either hire or to terminate the employment of carlton harris so there is that but i think the reason that those affidavits first somewhat scant is that they was there any discussion of whether harris could name the chief judge were the judge in charge of the juvenile center to avoid eleventh amendment immunity not to my the two agree that the court would be dismissed and i certainly didn't object to that but i think what's important here is the issue of control which the court has stated as the most and a general contractor demanded that an employee of a subcontractor be removed from a construction project and the the employee later sued both call and  the general contractor and i assume it's there i can't recall right now the actual employer but the claim against the general contractor was that you influenced the actual employer to fire me and therefore you had control over my employment over the hiring and firing and you should be the employer and this court said no that that cullen in that instance did not have adequate control over the situation that cullen did not have the ability to hire and to fire the employees of the subcontractor so even and even though that general contractor had influenced the decision of the of the direct employer to remove the person this court said that no that he did not have enough control in this case the the board of commissioners has very very little control charity murphy was involved to reduce county liability should any of them who are paid out of county funds allege something like this but she was taking her instructions from the court it's clear from the evidence that was submitted in this case that she spoke to china to write her trying to write her said with these restrictions mr harris can't perform the functions of his job and then ms murphy relayed that back to mr harris  likewise with regard to offer of employment coming out of the court because charity murphy was involved at that point because workers compensation had not yet been the case  one telling mr harris that the court could offer him you know whatever the wage was for a job and he declined but there was no actual control over the situation and i see my time is up i think this goes to judge opener's question at the beginning i just would like to point out that the state of the record is that she and her writer it is an undisputed fact said that she did not know that mr harris had been terminated miss murphy says that shantel riker directed her to terminate him because they couldn't be accommodated and was just acting as a liaison there is no evidence in the record to dispute the fact that she told mr harris she did not know he had been terminated this writer in her deposition said she spoke to her miss miss murphy said she spoke to miss riker for sure she said i may have spoke to another person but i can't remember i asked her did you speak to anybody else you know that said so so based upon that evidence a reasonable inference can be drawn that miss murphy at least participated in making this decision to terminate the judge in charge of these administrative things it prevent if i could just answer that question and this miss riker said didn't say she spoke to him and i asked her in the deposition did you speak to anybody else other than these two people and she said she said no so the state of the evidence