Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca10-93-06063/USCOURTS-ca10-93-06063-1/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 440
Nature of Suit: Other Civil Rights
Cause of Action: 

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.,-

Robert L. Hoecker 

Clerk 

Tenth Circuit 

Office of the Clerk 

C404 United States Courthouse 

Denver, Colorado 80294 

(303) 844-3157 

June 14, 1994 

Patrick Fisher 

Chief Deputy 

TO: ALL RECIPIENTS OF THE CAPTIONED OPINION 

RE: 93-6063, 93-6095, Lankford v. City of Hobart 

Filed May 16, 1994 by Judge McKay 

Please be advised that the court has entered an order 

granting rehearing, withdrawing the opinion and vacating the 

judgment filed on May 16, 1994, and simultaneously issuing a 

new opinion reflecting changes made in response to the city 

of Hobart's petition for rehearing. 

Attached is the new opinion. 

Attachment 

Very truly yours, 

ROBERT L. HOECKER, Clerk 

Byvf~~~ Barbara Schermerhorn 

Deputy Clerk 

Appellate Case: 93-6063 Document: 01019289457 Date Filed: 06/14/1994 Page: 1 
PUBLISH FILED 

United States Court of Apneals 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS Tenth Cireuit -

FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT 

LINDA K. LANKFORD and NANCY E. ) 

CALVARY, ) 

) 

Plaintiffs-Appellees, ) 

) 

"· ) 

) 

CITY OF HOBART and HOBART POLICE ) 

DEPARTMENT, ) 

) 

Defendants, ) 

) 

and ) 

) 

QUIRINO MEDRANO, JR., indi,idually) 

and as City Marshal and Police ) 

Chief of the City of Hobart, ) 

) 

Defendant-Appellant. ) 

LINDA K. LANKFORD and NANCY E. ) 

CALVARY, ) 

) 

Plaintiffs-Appellants, ) 

) 

"· ) ) 

CITY OF HOBART; HOBART POLICE ) 

DEPARTMENT; QUIRINO MEDRANO, JR., ) 

indi,idually and as City Marshal ) 

and Police Chief of the City of ) 

Hobart, ) 

) 

Defendants-Appellees. · ) 

:JUN _1 4 1994 

ROBERT L. HOECKER 

Clerk 

No. 93-6063 

No. 93-6095 

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF OKLAHOMA 

(D.C. No. CIV-92-164-H) 

Appellate Case: 93-6063 Document: 01019289457 Date Filed: 06/14/1994 Page: 2 
David w. Lee of Lee & Fields, P.C., Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, for 

Defendant-Appellant and Cross-Appellee Medrano. 

Tom R. Stephenson of Stephenson & Webber, Watonga, Oklahoma, for 

Plaintiffs-Appellees/Cross-Appellants Lankford and Calvary. 

(Andrew W. Lester, Mary J. Rounds, and Shannon F. Davies of Lester 

Bryant Solano Pilgrim & Ganz, Oklahoma City and Tulsa, Oklahoma, 

on the brief for Defendant-Appellee City of Hobart.) 

Before KELLY and McKAY, Circuit Judges, and ROGERS,* Senior 

District Judge. 

McKAY, Circuit Judge, 

Plaintiffs Lankford and Calvary filed suit in federal district court against Defendants City of Hobart and Quirino Medrano, 

the former police chief of the City of Hobart, seeking damages 

under 42 u.s.c. § 1983, Title VII, and various other federal and 

state law theories. Plaintiffs alleged that while they were 

employed as dispatchers at the Hobart police station, Mr. Medrano 

violated their privacy rights and created a hostile and abusive 

work environment by sexually harassing them. The alleged sexual 

harassment included fondling, requesting sexual favors, and making 

obscene gestures and unwelcome advances. Plaintiffs claimed that, 

when it became clear to Mr. Medrano that his sexual advances would 

not be accepted, he began "spying" on them while they were off 

duty and spreading rumors that Ms. Calvary was a lesbian. He also 

* Honorable Richard D. Rogers, Senior United States District 

Judge for the District of Kansas, sitting by designation. 

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Appellate Case: 93-6063 Document: 01019289457 Date Filed: 06/14/1994 Page: 3 
allegedly used his authority as chief of police to obtain Ms. 

Calvary's private medical records without her consent from a local 

hospital in an attempt to discredit her or to prove his statements 

that she was a lesbian. 

Before trial, both Defendants filed motions for summary judgment. The district court granted summary judgment in·favor of 

Defendant City of Hobart on all counts, and in favor of Defendant 

Medrano on all but the alleged right of privacy violation. 

Defendant Medrano appealed the denial of qualified immunity on the 

invasion of privacy action. Mr. Medrano's appeal was assigned 

case number 93-6063. Plaintiffs then cross-appealed all counts 

for which the district court granted summary judgment in favor of 

Defendants. This action was assigned case number 93-6095. Before 

oral argument, Defendants moved to dismiss Plaintiffs' crossappeal, number 93-6095, because it was from a non-final order 

which the trial court refused to certify pursuant to Rule 54(b). 

Although we have discretion to exercise appellate jurisdiction 

over a non-final order when it is sufficiently related to another 

appeal before the court, see Snell v. Tunnell, 920 F.2d 673, 676 

(lOth Cir. 1990), cert. denied, 499 u.s. 976 (1991), we granted 

Defendants' motion to dismiss. The dismissal left case number 93-

6063, Mr. Medrano's appeal, as th~ only action remaining before 

the court. In the interests of judicial economy, and for other 

reasons that will be apparent from our disposition today, we now 

reverse in part our earlier dismissal of Plaintiffs' cross-appeal 

as improvidently granted and exercise appellate jurisdiction over 

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Appellate Case: 93-6063 Document: 01019289457 Date Filed: 06/14/1994 Page: 4 
both case number 93-6063 and the claims in case number 93-6095 

brought against Mr. Medrano, so that all of Plaintiffs' claims 

against Mr. Medrano may be litigated at one time. Both cases have 

been fully briefed, and in fact, the issues in case number 93-6095 

were discussed thoroughly at oral argument. Because the city of 

Hobart was not represented at oral argument, and because 

Plaintiffs did not adequately put the City on notice that they 

were pursuing the Title VII claim despite having that claim 

previously dismissed as premature, we will not at this time review 

issues in case number 93-6095 relating to the City of Hobart. 

We first address Mr. Medrano's appeal on the S 1983 invasion 

of privacy action, case number 93-6063. In denying Mr. Medrano's 

motion for summary judgment on this issue, the district court 

found that a privacy violation may have occurred and that Mr. 

Medrano was not qualifiedly immune from liability because the 

violation was clearly established. It is less than clear from the 

district court's Order as to the alleged facts on which it based 

its holding of a privacy violation. The parties have assumed on 

appeal that the court simply equated garden-variety sexual 

harassment with a violation of privacy rights. Both parties 

agree, as does this court, that it was not clearly established at 

the time of the conduct in questi9n that sexual harassment 

violated constitutional privacy interests. However, relying on 

logical inferences and the holding and facts of the case cited by 

the district court, we believe that the district court did not 

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Appellate Case: 93-6063 Document: 01019289457 Date Filed: 06/14/1994 Page: 5 
find that the alleged acts of sexual harassment violated Plaintiffs' privacy rights; rather, we believe that, in finding sufficient allegations of a clearly established privacy violation, 

the district court was referring to Plaintiff Calvary's allegations that Mr. Medrano seized.and reviewed her private medical 

records. In this sense, the district court was correct. 1 

Ms. Calvary alleges that Mr. Medrano's actions concerning the 

medical records occurred sometime after September of 1990. The 

district court cited Eastwood v. Department of Corrections of 

Oklahoma, 846 F.2d 627 (lOth Cir. 1988), for its proposition that 

Mr. Medrano's alleged privacy violation was clearly established in 

1990. In Eastwood this court held that a state employee was not 

qualifiedly immune for a privacy violation when he pressured one 

of his female subordinates to disclose to him private information 

about her sexual history. Only two differences exist between 

Eastwood and the present case. The first difference is the precise method by which the private information was obtained. In 

Eastwood the state official pressured the victim to disclose the 

private information, while in this case Mr. Medrano allegedly 

obtained the private information by seizing Ms. Calvary's medical 

records from a local hospital without her consent and without a 

warrant. However, because Eastwood was broadly concerned with 

protecting employees' private information from being obtained by 

1 If our determination as 

court's finding of a privacy 

simply affirm the finding of 

grounds. 

to the grounds for the district 

violation is incorrect, then we 

a privacy violation on separate 

-sAppellate Case: 93-6063 Document: 01019289457 Date Filed: 06/14/1994 Page: 6 
their employers without a valid reason--not with preventing government coercion--this difference is immaterial. The second difference is the nature of the private information. In Eastwood, 

the information concerned the victim's sexual history, while in 

this case the information concerned the victim's personal medical 

history. This difference is likewise immaterial, because there is 

"no question that an employee's medical records, which may contain 

intimate facts of a personal nature, are well within the ambit of 

materials entitled to privacy protection." Woods v. White, 689 F. 

Supp. 874, 876 (W.O. Wis. 1988) (quoting United States v. 

Westinghouse Corp., 638 F.2d 570, 577 (3rd Cir. 1980)). See also 

Mangels v. Pena, 789 F.2d 836, 839 (lOth Cir. 1986); Tavoulareas 

v. Washington Post Co., 724 F.2d 1010, 1020 (D.C. Cir. 1984). 

Plaintiff Calvary has alleged facts which, if true, would undoubtedly establish a prima facie case that a clearly established privacy violation occurred, and therefore, the denial of Mr. 

Medrano's summary judgment motion on this point is affirmed. 2 

We now turn to the Plaintiffs' appeal against Mr. Medrano in 

case number 93-6095. Because Title VII applies only to an 

2 The district court simply held that a privacy violation 

occurred and did not specify which of the Plaintiffs had 

sufficiently alleged such a violation. Because the allegations 

surrounding the medical records pertain to Ms. Calvary only, it is 

clear that Ms. Lankford is not a party to the alleged privacy 

violation. In addition, it is possible that a Fourth Amendment 

violation occurred when, as Ms. Calvary alleges, Mr. Medrano 

"seized" her protected medical files without a warrant. Although 

Plaintiff argued this point in front of the district court, she 

has failed adequately to address the Fourth Amendment implications 

of Mr. Medrano's actions on appeal. Therefore, we do not address 

this issue. 

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Appellate Case: 93-6063 Document: 01019289457 Date Filed: 06/14/1994 Page: 7 
employer, in this case the City of Hobart, ~ Sauers, 1 F.3d at 

1125, we need only address the S 1983 claim against Mr. Medrano. 

No other claims brought against Mr. Medrano below, such as the 

Fair Labor Standards Act and intentional infliction of emotional 

distress, have been properly ~aised on appeal by Plaintiffs, and 

therefore, we will not address them. The district court granted 

summary judgment to Defendant Medrano on the S 1983 claim, finding 

that he was shielded by qualified immunity--presumably because the 

court believed that at the time of the conduct in question it was 

not clearly established that sexual harassment violated equal 

protection principles. According to Plaintiffs, the alleged 

sexual harassment first began in November of 1989. Contrary to 

the urging of Mr. Medrano in his brief, we hold that on May 22, 

1989, with this court's opinion in Starrett v. Wadley, 876 F.2d 

808, 814 (lOth Cir. 1989), it became clearly established that sexual harassment can constitute a violation of equal protection and 

give rise to an action under 42 u.s.c. S 1983. Woodward v. City 

of Worland, 977 F.2d 1392, 1398 (lOth Cir. 1992) (holding that 

with Starrett, it became clearly established in the Tenth Circuit 

that sexual harassment can violate the Fourteenth Amendment right 

to equal protection), cert. denied sub. nom., Woodard (sic] v. 

Seghetti, 113 s. ct. 3038 (1993). 

In his brief, Defendant Medrano acknowledges the Starrett 

decision, but argues that that case merely held that sexual 

harassment coupled with firing or discharge is actionable as an 

equal protection violation under S 1983. Defendant fundamentally 

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Appellate Case: 93-6063 Document: 01019289457 Date Filed: 06/14/1994 Page: 8 
resigned on her own will. The Eighth Circuit allowed her S 1983 

claim based on the alleged sexual harassment to proceed, despite 

the fact that she had not been fired. 

Third, the Starrett decision itself states plainly that a 

discharge from employment is not required for a S 1983 equal protection claim based on sexual harassment to succeed. In several 

places in the opinion the court inqicates that the fondling, 

unwelcome advances, and obscene remarks are sufficient alone to 

constitute sexual harassment "separate from the firing." 

Starrett, 876 F.2d at 808; id. at n.16 (discussing the discharge 

and then referring to the other acts of sexual harassment). This 

language, coupled with the broad and unequivocal statements 

throughout the opinion holding that sexual harassment can violate 

the Fourteenth Amendment, leaves no doubt that by May 1989 sexual 

harassment--with or without a discharge from employment--could 

give rise to a § 1983 suit based on equal protection rights. See 

Woodward, 977 F.2d 1397-1400 (Starrett clearly established fact 

that discharge is not essential to a S 1983 claim predicated on 

equal protection). The fact of discharge merely goes to the 

question of harassment damages and is not determinative of whether 

a cause of action can be maintained. Therefore, we reverse the 

district court in its grant of summary judgment to Mr. Medrano on .. 

this point, and reinstate Plaintiffs' 42 u.s.c. S 1983 suit based 

on the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. 

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Appellate Case: 93-6063 Document: 01019289457 Date Filed: 06/14/1994 Page: 9 
In sum, the district court's determination in case number 93-

6063 is AFFIRMED. In case number 93-6095, the judgment of the 

district court is REVERSED as to Plaintiffs' S 1983 claim against 

Mr. Medrano. We decline to exercise jurisdiction over the claims 

in case number 93-6095 against the City of Hobart because they are 

premature. The case is REMANDED for further proceedings 

consistent with this opinion. 

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Appellate Case: 93-6063 Document: 01019289457 Date Filed: 06/14/1994 Page: 10