UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

BARBARA JEAN FORD, 

Plaintiff-Appellant,

v.

STUART O. SIMMS, Secretary,

Maryland Department of Public

Safety and Correctional Services;

MARYLAND DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC

SAFETY AND CORRECTIONAL SERVICES;

STATE OF MARYLAND; GEORGE

KALOROUMAKIS, Assistant Warden,

Eastern Correctional Institution;

EDMUND O’LEARY, Division of

Corrections Internal Investigative  No. 00-1649

Unit Headquarters; DALE MCCLOUD,

Maryland Department of Public

Safety and Correctional Services;

LAURA RIEKEN DORSEY, Eastern

Correctional Institution; RALPH

LOGAN, Warden, Baltimore City

Detention Center,

Defendants-Appellees.

PUBLIC JUSTICE CENTER,

INCORPORATED; WOMEN’S LAW

CENTER OF MARYLAND,

INCORPORATED,

Amici Curiae. 

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Maryland, at Baltimore.

J. Frederick Motz, District Judge.

(CA-99-3580-JFM)
Argued: April 4, 2001

Decided: December 14, 2001

Before WIDENER and NIEMEYER, Circuit Judges, and

Lacy H. THORNBURG, United States District Judge

for the Western District of North Carolina, sitting by designation.

Affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded by unpublished per

curiam opinion. 

COUNSEL

ARGUED: Robin R. Cockey, COCKEY, BRENNAN &

MALONEY, Salisbury, Maryland, for Appellant. Scott Sheldon Oakley, Assistant Attorney General, Department of Public Safety and

Correctional Services, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellees. ON

BRIEF: Deborah A. Jeon, AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION

FOUNDATION OF MARYLAND, Centreville, Maryland, for Appellant. J. Joseph Curran, Jr., Attorney General of Maryland, Department

of Public Safety and Correctional Services, Baltimore, Maryland, for

Appellees. Gregg H. Levy, Susan L. Burke, Sara L. Gottovi, COVINGTON & BURLING, Washington, D.C., for Amici Curiae.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. See

Local Rule 36(c). 

OPINION

PER CURIAM: 

This case requires us to decide whether Barbara Jean Ford failed

to state a claim in her complaint against the State of Maryland and

2 FORD v. SIMMS
several of her former supervisors and co-workers at Eastern Correctional Institution in Westover, Maryland. Miss Ford brought various

claims, including claims under Title VII, after her consensual sexual

relationship with one of her supervisors ended and she was eventually

fired. The district court dismissed all of Miss Ford’s claims under

Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6) for failure to state a claim. See Ford v.

Simms, Civil No. JFM-99-3580 (D. Md. April 21, 2000). We have

jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and for the reasons stated below,

we affirm in part, reverse in part, and remand. 

As alleged in her complaint, Barbara Ford became employed as a

prison guard at Maryland’s Eastern Correctional Institution in 1987.*

Shortly thereafter, she began a consensual sexual relationship with

one of her supervisors, Ralph Logan, then a captain at the prison.

During the course of the relationship, Miss Ford loaned money to

Logan. In late 1991, Miss Ford ended both her sexual and her financial relationship with Logan, who had by then become the prison’s

warden. 

Miss Ford was promoted to Sergeant in 1998. However, Logan

extended Miss Ford’s probationary status as a Sergeant. After Miss

Ford challenged Logan’s extension of her probationary status, though,

his decision was reversed. 

Miss Ford, nevertheless, persisted in her complaint with respect to

sexual harassment and, as a result of the various differences she had

with Logan and the prison administration, she was discharged on

April 14, 1999. After she was fired, Miss Ford filed a complaint with

the EEOC and was issued a right-to-sue letter on August 30, 1999. 

The district court dismissed Miss Ford’s complaint because the

employment actions she challenged were not caused by her gender

but by personal animosity stemming from her failed consensual sexual relationship with Warden Logan, following Campbell v. Masten,

955 F. Supp. 526 (D. Md. 1997); because she had alleged only interlocutory or immediate decisions which do not give rise to cognizable

*Our recitation of the facts of this case are those found in Miss Ford’s

complaint, which we accept as true for the purposes of this appeal.

Mayes v. Rapoport, 198 F.3d 457, 460 (4th Cir. 1999). 

FORD v. SIMMS 3
claims under Page v. Bolger, 645 F.2d 227, 233 (4th Cir. 1981); that

claims for retaliatory discharge were not supported by allegation of

facts establishing any causal connection between her termination of

employment and her exercise of Title VII rights; that there was no

claim of race-based discrimination under 42 U.S.C. § 1981; that she

had identified no liberty or property interest of which she had been

deprived and, therefore, had no due process claim; that the alleged

facts were not sufficient to trigger a continuing violation; that claims

arising before more than 300 days before the filing of the administrative claim were time-barred; that claims asserted under 42 U.S.C.

§ 1983 or the Maryland Constitution were time-barred, being more

than three years old; that Title VII claims against the individual

defendants were dismissed because they were not employers and not

named in the EEOC charge; and that § 1983 claims might not be

maintained against the State of Maryland or the individual defendants

in their official capacities. 

We have have examined the complaint and are of opinion the decision of the district court is without reversible error, with one exception. 

Paragraph 23 of Miss Ford’s complaint reads, in pertinent part, as

follows:

When, however, it became clear that Ms. Ford had no intention of renewing her relationship with Warden Logan, he, on

a pretext, directed Ms. Ford’s probationary status as a Sergeant be extended [to retaliate] against Ms. Ford . . . . 

Thus, it is a fair reading of the facts alleged in the complaint that

Logan sought to renew his sexual relationship with Miss Ford, was

rebuffed, and took adverse actions against her because of it. We hold

that such allegations state a claim under Title VII. See Burlington

Indus. v. Ellerth, 524 U.S. 742, 753, 760 (1998) (recognizing claims

as ones in which a plaintiff proves that her refusal to submit to a

supervisors demands for sex resulted in a tangible employment

action). Since paragraph 23 of the complaint states a Title VII cause

of action, we are of opinion there are not sufficient facts shown in the

complaint in order for it to have been dismissed at this stage. Other4 FORD v. SIMMS
wise, we affirm the dismissal of the complaint for the reasons stated

by the district court. 

The judgment of the district court is thus affirmed in part and

reversed in part, and the case is remanded for reconsideration of paragraph 23 of the complaint, including further factual development,

should the district court be so advised. 

AFFIRMED IN PART, REVERSED IN PART,

AND REMANDED WITH INSTRUCTIONS

FORD v. SIMMS 5