UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 10-1999

TINA MAWING; HORSEMEN’S BENEVOLENT PROTECTION ASSOCIATION,

Plaintiffs - Appellees,

v.

PNGI CHARLES TOWN GAMING, L.L.C., d/b/a Charles Town Races 

and Slots,

Defendant - Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern

District of West Virginia, at Martinsburg. John Preston Bailey,

Chief District Judge. (3:09-cv-00068-JPB)

Submitted: March 28, 2011 Decided: May 2, 2011

Before MOTZ, GREGORY, and AGEE, Circuit Judges.

Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

Brian M. Peterson, Charles F. Printz, Jr., BOWLES, RICE, 

MCDAVID, GRAFF & LOVE, P.L.L.C., Martinsburg, West Virginia, 

Joseph E. Wolfson, Stacey A. Scrivani, STEVENS & LEE, P.C., King 

of Prussia, Pennsylvania, for Appellant. David M. Hammer, 

HAMMER, FERRETTI & SCHIAVONI, Martinsburg, West Virginia, Harry 

P. Waddell, LAW OFFICE OF HARRY P. WADDELL, Martinsburg, West 

Virginia, Gregory A. Bailey, ARNOLD & BAILEY, Shepherdstown, 

West Virginia, for Appellees.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
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PER CURIAM:

Tina Mawing, a racehorse trainer, and the Horseman’s 

Benevolent Protective Association (“HBPA”), a non-profit 

bargaining representative for West Virginia horsemen, filed a 

complaint against PNGI Charles Town Gaming, LLC, d/b/a Charles 

Town Races and Slots (“CTRS”), seeking injunctive relief and 

damages for breach of contract, due process, and retaliation 

claims arising out of CTRS’s denial of horse stalls to Mawing. 

CTRS moved for summary judgment, and the district court 

submitted the claims to arbitration pursuant to the arbitration 

provision1 in the collective bargaining agreement between HBPA 

and CTRS.2

CTRS appealed, arguing that (1) the contractual claim 

was correctly submitted to arbitration but that the due process 

and retaliation claims were not covered by the arbitration 

 CTRS filed a Fed. R. Civ. P. 59(e) motion to alter or 

amend the judgment, which the district court denied. 

 1 The arbitration provision reads:

In the event there is a disagreement between the 

parties as to whether any party has complied with the 

terms or conditions in this Agreement, then Charles 

Town Races and the HBPA shall each choose an 

Arbitrator and the two Arbitrators shall choose a 

third Arbitrator. The Board of Arbitrators shall 

decide the issues involved and each party agrees to be 

bound by the decision of the arbitration panel.

2 Mawing is an HBPA member. Pursuant to the agreement, HBPA 

is the exclusive bargaining agent of its members.
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agreement; (2) the district court erred in declining to grant 

summary judgment on the non-contract claims; and (3) the 

district court erred in denying its Rule 59(e) motion. Finding 

no reversible error, we affirm.

We review a district court’s arbitrability 

determination de novo. United States v. Bankers Ins. Co., 245 

F.3d 315, 319 (4th Cir. 2001). The Federal Arbitration Act, 9 

U.S.C. §§ 1-14 (2006), provides that a written arbitration 

agreement “shall be valid, irrevocable, and enforceable, save 

upon such grounds as exist at law or in equity for the 

revocation of any contract.” 9 U.S.C. § 2. To compel 

arbitration, a court must find that an arbitration agreement 

exists between two parties and that the dispute at issue falls 

within the scope of the agreement. Hightower v. GMRI, Inc., 272 

F.3d 239, 242 (4th Cir. 2001). “To decide whether an 

arbitration agreement encompasses a dispute a court must 

determine whether the factual allegations underlying the claim 

are within the scope of the arbitration clause, regardless of 

the legal label assigned to the claim.” J.J. Ryan & Sons, 

Inc. v. Rhone Poulenc Textile, S.A., 863 F.2d 315, 319 (4th Cir. 

1988). In assessing arbitrability, a court is obliged to give 

effect to the intentions of the parties, but any ambiguities 

regarding the scope of an arbitration clause should be resolved 
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in favor of arbitration. Wachovia Bank, Nat’l Ass’n v. Schmidt, 

445 F.3d 762, 767 (4th Cir. 2006).

We hold that the district court properly submitted all 

of Plaintiffs’ claims to arbitration. The allocation of stalls 

is governed by the HBPA agreement’s “stalls” provision. As the 

arbitration agreement covers disputes over compliance with the 

terms or conditions of the HBPA agreement, it extends to the 

stalls provision. Thus, regardless of Plaintiffs’ due process 

and retaliation labels, their factual allegation that CTRS 

improperly refused to allocate stalls to Mawing falls within the 

scope of the arbitration agreement. Because the district court 

did not err in submitting the claims to arbitration, we further 

hold that the district court correctly declined to reach the 

merits of the due process and retaliation claims, see AT&T 

Tech., Inc. v. Commc’n Workers for Am., 475 U.S. 643, 649 

(1986), and properly denied CTRS’s Rule 59(e) motion. See

Robinson v. Wix Filtration Corp., 599 F.3d 403, 407 (4th Cir. 

2010).

Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s orders. 

We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal 

contentions are adequately presented in the materials before the

court and argument would not aid the decisional process.

AFFIRMED