2011 Decisions

Opinions of the United

States Court of Appeals

for the Third Circuit

6-28-2011

John Bialko, Jr. v. Quaker Oats Company

Precedential or Non-Precedential: Non-Precedential

Docket No. 10-2273

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Recommended Citation

"John Bialko, Jr. v. Quaker Oats Company" (2011). 2011 Decisions. Paper 1007.

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NOT PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

_____________

No. 10-2273

_____________

JOHN BIALKO, JR.,

 Appellant,

v.

THE QUAKER OATS COMPANY; 

SVC MANUFACTURING, INC.1,

 Appellees.

_______________

On Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Middle District of Pennsylvania

(D.C. No. 08-cv-364)

District Judge: Hon. Thomas I. Vanaskie

_______________

Submitted Under Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a)

June 22, 2011

Before: CHAGARES, JORDAN and GREENAWAY, JR., Circuit Judges.

(Filed June 28, 2011 )

_______________

OPINION OF THE COURT

_______________

 

1 Amended see Clerk’s Order dated 6/15/10.
2

JORDAN, Circuit Judge.

Appellant John Bialko, Jr. (“Bialko”), appeals the order of the United States 

District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania granting summary judgment for 

The Quaker Oats Company (“Quaker”) and a related company, SVC Manufacturing, Inc.

(“SVC”), on Bialko’s claims of disability discrimination and retaliation under the 

Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (“ADA”), 42 U.S.C. §§ 12101-12300, and the 

Pennsylvania Human Relations Act (“PHRA”), 43 P.S. §§ 951-963, which arose out of 

SVC’s denial of Bialko’s request to work only 40 hours per week upon his return from a 

leave of absence based on a panic disorder. Bialko also appeals the District Court’s 

denial of his motion to compel discovery. For substantially the reasons articulated by the 

District Court, we will affirm.

I. Background2

SVC was a wholly-owned subsidiary of Stokely-Van Camp, Inc., which was a 

wholly-owned subsidiary of Quaker Oats Company. SVC operated a manufacturing 

facility in Mountain Top, Pennsylvania. All hourly production employees at the facility 

were SVC employees governed by a collective-bargaining agreement (the “CBA”). The 

CBA provided that all hourly production employees must work overtime, i.e., more than 

40 hours in a week, when production needs dictated. 

 

2 Because we write only for the parties, we assume their familiarity with the facts. 

More detailed factual background is set forth in the District Court’s thorough opinion, 

Bialko v. Quaker Oats, 2010 WL 1330285 (M.D. Pa., Mar. 30, 2010).
3

Bialko began working as a forklift driver at the facility in 1999. In 2002, he was 

diagnosed as having panic and generalized anxiety disorders. On July 29, 2005, Bialko 

had to leave work by ambulance due to what he reported as an elevated heart rate, 

lightheadedness, and an inability to stand. A few weeks later, Bialko requested leave 

under the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993, certifying to SVC that he occasionally 

had severe anxiety and panic attacks that rendered him unable to work. SVC approved 

Bialko’s request. 

In July 2006, Bialko submitted to SVC a letter from his doctor indicating that he 

could return to work, with the only restriction being that he could not work more than 40 

hours per week. SVC refused at that time to allow Bialko to return to work with the 40-

hour workweek restriction. 

In November 2006, Bialko submitted a complaint to the Pennsylvania Human 

Relations Commission, alleging that the refusal to grant him a 40-hour workweek 

constituted discrimination based on his medical conditions. In February 2008, Bialko 

sued SVC and Quaker in the District Court, alleging violations of the ADA and PHRA. 

In March 2010, in separate orders, the District Court both denied Bialko’s motion to 

compel Appellees’ response to certain interrogatories and document production requests 

and granted summary judgment for SVC and Quaker on all claims. This appeal followed.
4

II. Discussion3

Summary judgment can properly be granted when “the pleadings, the discovery 

and disclosure materials on file, and any affidavits show that there is no genuine issue as 

to any material fact.”

4

 FED. R. CIV. P. 56(c)(2). Here, summary judgment for Quaker 

was proper. Bialko’s paychecks and tax forms leave no genuine dispute that he was 

employed by SVC, not Quaker. The evidence to which Bialko cites in arguing that there 

is a genuine issue of material fact as to his employer – receiving a service plaque from 

Quaker, having Quaker’s name appear on his uniform and on a sign outside the work 

 

3

The District Court had jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 1331 and 1367. We 

have jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We review de novo a district court’s 

grant of summary judgment and “apply the same standard as the District Court in 

determining whether summary judgment was appropriate.” Dique v. N.J. State Police, 

603 F.3d 181, 185 (3d Cir. 2010) (citations omitted). We review for abuse of discretion a 

district court’s denial of a motion to compel discovery. Camiolo v. State Farm Fire & 

Cas. Co., 334 F.3d 345, 354 (3d Cir. 2003).

4 A factual dispute is “genuine,” and thus warrants trial, “if the evidence is such 

that a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the nonmoving party ... . The mere 

existence of a scintilla of evidence in support of the plaintiff’s position will be 

insufficient; there must be [significantly probative] evidence on which the jury could 

reasonably find for the plaintiff.” Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248, 

252 (1986); Williams v. Borough of W. Chester, 891 F.2d 458, 460 (3d Cir. 1989) (“[A] 

non-moving party ... cannot simply reassert factually unsupported allegations contained 

in its pleadings.”). We assume that the non-moving party’s allegations are true and give 

the non-moving party the benefit of the doubt when those allegations conflict with the 

moving party’s claims. Valhal Corp. v. Sullivan Assocs., 44 F.3d 195, 200 (3d Cir. 

1995). However, summary judgment must be entered against any party unable to present 

sufficient evidence in support of an essential element of a claim because “a complete 

failure of proof concerning an essential element of the nonmoving party’s case 

necessarily renders all other facts immaterial.” Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 

323 (1986).
5

facility, and sending complaints to a Quaker email address – suggests only that Quaker 

and SVC were related entities, not that Quaker employed Bialko. The evidence also fails 

to show that Quaker directed SVC to deny Bialko’s request for accommodation or that 

the two companies were otherwise so integrated as to be treated as one enterprise. The 

unrebutted affidavit of the SVC human resources employee who handled Bialko’s 

requests establishes that SVC was the sole decision-maker with respect to Bialko’s 

requested accommodations. We will therefore affirm the District Court’s grant of 

summary judgment for Quaker. 

Summary judgment for SVC was also proper. To succeed on his ADA and PHRA 

claims,5 Bialko must show, as a threshold matter, that he is “disabled” under the ADA. 

Shaner v. Synthes, 204 F.3d 494, 500 (3d Cir. 2000). To be “disabled” under the ADA 

requires more than simply a diagnosed impairment. Toyota Motor Mfg. v. Williams, 534 

U.S. 184, 198 (2002), superseded on other grounds by Pub. L. No. 110-325 (2008). 

Rather, a person must have “a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one 

or more major life activities”; “a record of such an impairment”; or been “regarded as 

having such an impairment.” 42 U.S.C. § 12102(1).

 

5

The analytical framework used to evaluate a disability discrimination claim 

under the PHRA is effectively indistinguishable from that under the ADA, thus allowing 

courts to dispose of both ADA and PHRA claims on the same grounds. See Rinehimer v. 

Cemcolift, Inc., 292 F.3d 375, 382 (3d Cir. 2002) (noting that the PHRA, in all “relevant 

respects,” was “basically the same as the ADA” and was interpreted “in accord” with the 

ADA and related case law, thus meaning that “disposition of [plaintiff’s] ADA claim 

applie[d] with equal force to his PHRA claim”). 
6

Bialko claims that his panic and anxiety disorders substantially limited him in the 

major life activities of working, thinking, concentrating, and socializing, but neither the 

law nor the record in this case supports his claim. Regarding working, Bialko’s claimed 

inability to work overtime does not constitute a substantial limitation. See, e.g., Cotter v. 

Ajilon Servs., Inc., 287 F.3d 593, 598 (6th Cir. 2002) (stating that “inability to work 

overtime is not a substantial limitation on the ability to work”); Kellogg v. Union Pac. 

R.R. Co., 233 F.3d 1083, 1087-88 (8th Cir. 2000) (same); Tardie v. Rehab. Hosp. of R.I., 

168 F.3d 538, 542 (1st Cir. 1999) (noting that a 40-hour workweek restriction is not a 

substantial limitation in working because it still leaves a person qualified for a broad 

range of jobs). Regarding thinking and concentrating, none of the documentation of 

Bialko’s medical condition indicates that his disorders were substantially impairing his 

abilities to think or concentrate at the time he returned to work. That is fatal to Bialko’s 

claim, since the ADA requires that a person be substantially impaired contemporaneous 

with his or her seeking accommodation. See Sutton v. United Air Lines, Inc., 527 U.S. 

471, 482 (1999) (concluding that the ADA, by its language, requires “that a person be 

presently – not potentially or hypothetically – substantially limited in order to 

demonstrate a disability”), superseded on other grounds by Pub. L. No. 110-325 (2008). 

Last, regarding socializing, Bialko’s only evidence of impairment was his wife’s 

testimony that he was disinclined to go out in public by himself or to socialize with

groups of 20 to 30 people. That testimony, however, hardly portrays Bialko’s condition 

as atypical and thus fails to show impairment under the ADA. See 29 C.F.R. 
7

§1630.2(j)(1)(ii) (“An impairment is a disability within the meaning of this section if it 

substantially limits the ability of an individual to perform a major life activity as 

compared to most people in the general population.”). Accordingly, Bialko failed to 

show that he is substantially limited in a major life activity. He also failed to show that 

SVC regarded him as having such a limitation, as the only evidence to which he cites –

the paying of disability benefits under a non-ADA standard – does not, as a matter of 

logic, establish that SVC regarded Bialko as being substantially impaired in a major life 

activity.

6

As for Bialko’s retaliation claim, he failed to raise it at the administrative level and 

thus did not properly preserve it before the District Court. See Atkinson v. LaFayette 

Coll., 460 F.3d 447, 453 (3d Cir. 2006) (noting, in the context of a Title VII retaliation 

claim, that “the parameters of the civil action in the district court are defined by” the 

scope of the administrative charge and concluding that a retaliation claim that sounded in 

Title IX was not fairly within the scope of the EEOC’s Title VII investigation and could 

thus properly be disposed of in defendant’s favor). Summary judgment in SVC’s favor

on the retaliation claim, then, was appropriate. 

Finally, with respect to Bialko’s motion to compel discovery, the record reveals 

that Bialko’s counsel contravened Rule 37 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure by 

filing the motion without first having attempted to confer in good faith with Appellees’ 

 

6 Bialko does not argue that there was a record of him being substantially 

impaired.
8

counsel regarding the pending discovery requests. Moreover, the District Court noted

that the requests were, among other things, either duplicative of information that had 

already been disclosed or were patently overbroad. We cannot say that the District Court

abused its discretion in those rulings. 

IV. Conclusion

For the foregoing reasons, we will affirm the judgment of the District Court.