IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS 

EASTERN DIVISION 

RONALD CHRISTOPHER, 

Plaintiff, 

v. 

THE CITY OF CHICAGO, 

Defendant. 

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No. 20-cv-2716 

Judge John J. Tharp, Jr. 

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER 

Plaintiff Ronald Christopher, a former City of Chicago employee who the City fired in 

2013, applied for a different position with the City in 2018. The City initially moved forward with 

his application but then declined to hire him during the final stages of the screening process, 

ostensibly for reasons relating to his prior termination. The plaintiff, however, attributes the City’s 

decision not to hire him to age discrimination, in violation of the ADEA, and retaliation for 

engaging in protected First Amendment activity, actionable under 42 U.S.C. Section 1983. The 

City has moved for summary judgment on both claims, and the plaintiff has moved for partial 

summary judgment on his retaliation claim. For the reasons that follow, the City’s motion for 

summary judgment is granted in its entirety and, accordingly, the plaintiff’s motion for partial 

summary judgment is denied. 

FACTUAL BACKGROUND1

The plaintiff, Ronald Christopher, worked for the City’s Department of Fleet and Facility 

Management (2FM) from 2002 to 2013. DSMF ¶ 1. In November 2018, he applied for the position 

of Emergency Crew Dispatcher (ECD) with the City’s Department of Water Management (DWM). 

1

 Unless stated otherwise, the following facts are undisputed. 

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He was 58 years old at the time of his application. DSMF ¶ 2. In July 2019, after participating in 

the City’s pre-employment screening process, Mr. Christopher learned that the City was not hiring 

him for the ECD position. DSMF ¶¶ 4, 34. He claims that in declining to hire him, the City acted 

on discriminatory motives with respect to his age and his prior speech criticizing the City’s hiring 

practices when he was employed with the 2FM almost a decade earlier. The City disputes that its 

decision not to hire Christopher was based on any discriminatory or retaliatory motive. The City 

contends its decision was based on its discovery during the screening process that the City had 

previously fired the plaintiff from his 2FM role for disciplinary reasons relating to unprofessional 

conduct in the workplace. 

Christopher’s Prior Employment with the City at 2FM and Termination 

Mr. Christopher’s job title at 2FM from February 2002 until October 2013 was Assistant 

to the Commissioner. PSMF ¶ 6. He believed he outperformed his position, so when the position 

of Manager of Vehicle Maintenance opened up in 2010, he applied for it, thinking he had a good 

shot. PSMF ¶ 9. To his disappointment, he was not placed on the referral list of qualified 

candidates. Id. He continued to perform tasks more typically associated with a higher position 

despite his lower title and pay, and when a job posting for the managerial position opened up again 

later in 2010, he applied and was again not placed on the referral list of candidates. PSMF ¶ 11. In 

June 2013, he applied for two other open positions for which he believed he was qualified. Despite 

his perception that he was entitled to at least interview for those positions, he was again passed 

over. Mr. Christopher complained internally between 2006 and 2013 to his colleagues and 

supervisors about being passed over as a result of what he perceived as political hiring practices.2

2

 There is no evidence in the record of whether he was complaining at that time that the 

hiring practices were capital-P “Political” in the sense of political parties, lowercase-p “political” 

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DSMF ¶ 9. He has set forth some evidence that superiors at multiple points indicated that his 

contributions would eventually be recognized via a promotion or in some other manner. In August 

2013, the City audited the plaintiff’s position to potentially reclassify him. Although the audit 

ultimately confirmed that he was outperforming his position (i.e., performing duties of a manager 

or director), he was not promoted at that time and in fact was given a new title that he considered 

a demotion. 

He proceeded to confront his boss, Walter West, about being continuously passed over for 

new positions and the results of the audit process. PSMF ¶ 26; DSMF ¶ 17. He entered West’s 

office and closed the door. The confrontation involved the plaintiff raising his voice and using 

profanity. He admitted in his deposition testimony that he had behaved unprofessionally. DSMF ¶ 

16, 50. Another individual overheard the argument and alerted 2FM Commissioner Reynolds. The 

plaintiff was sent home, and the next day he received a termination letter indicating that he was 

being terminated as a result of the incident. DSMF ¶ 19-21. He subsequently submitted formal 

complaints about his treatment and lack of promotions/hiring to the Shakman monitor at the City’s 

Office of Inspector General, though those complaints never prompted an investigation. DSMF ¶ 

22-23. For clarity, the Court notes that the plaintiff is not presently bringing a claim that his 2FM 

termination was discriminatory or otherwise violative of his rights. His claim is that these 

complaints about the City’s hiring practices were protected speech for which the City decided not 

to hire him several years later. 

in the general sense of relating to the strategic navigation of relationships that bear on the exercise 

of power, or both. 

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The Plaintiff’s Application for the ECD Position with DWM

 In November 2018, the City posted two job openings in ECD with the DWM. Mr. 

Christopher applied about ten days later. DSMF ¶ 25. His application listed 

“Terminated/Disciplinary” as the reason for leaving his prior position of Assistant to the 

Commissioner. ECF No. 45-1 at Ex. 26. Martin Wise, a recruiter for the Department of Human 

Resources, screened applications to ensure they complied with the application directions. Wise 

determined that twelve applicants, including Mr. Christopher, met the minimum qualifications for 

the job. DSMF ¶ 27. Four of the twelve, again including Christopher, passed the mandatory 

aptitude tests, which the City used in lieu of interviews. DSMF ¶ 28. Of those four, two were 

selected by a random lottery: Mr. Christopher and April Sherman. If either failed a required 

background check or declined the job offer, the job would go to one of the lottery applicants who 

was not selected. DSMF ¶ 32. Wise then forwarded the referral list to DWM’s personnel 

department in June 2019 to initiate the background-check and pre-hire paperwork processes. 

A few days later, the plaintiff was invited to come in and fill out paperwork, including a 

criminal background disclosure release form, which asks candidates about their prior employment 

with the City, among other things such as their date of birth. Included in the form was the question: 

“Have you ever been discharged or resigned in lieu of discharge from the City of Chicago?” Mr. 

Christopher checked, “Yes.” Under “termination reason/incident,” he wrote, “Upon being refused 

interviews for every position I had applied for, I questioned the Department’s hiring practices. I 

was then released.” DSMF ¶ 37. He also entered his date of birth on his release form. PSAMF 

¶ 72. 

Jacqueline Toledo was the Director of Administration for DWM in July 2019. Her duties 

in this role included overseeing the ECD hiring process. DSMF ¶ 39. She investigated the 

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circumstances surrounding Mr. Christopher’s termination from 2FM and learned that the official 

reason for his termination was misconduct relating to the argument with his supervisor, West. She 

accordingly considered Mr. Christopher’s response to the termination reason question on the 

release form to be misleading. DSMF ¶ 42. She spoke with Wise, and Wise obtained 

documentation related to Mr. Christopher’s termination from 2FM (such as his personnel file). 

Wise spoke with his supervisor, DHR Deputy Commissioner Kathleen Doyle, about Toledo’s 

indication that DWM would prefer not to hire Mr. Christopher because of his past misconduct at 

2FM and his misrepresentation on the criminal background form and provided her with the 

corresponding documentation. DSMF ¶ 44. Deputy Commissioner Doyle emailed Wise back, 

stating, “DWM has the right to forgo moving forward with the candidate based on the information 

regarding the circumstances surrounding his prior termination with the City and his 

misrepresentation on the criminal background form.” DSMF ¶ 46. After Toledo learned from Wise 

that DWM had the discretion to not hire Mr. Christopher, she called Mr. Christopher to inform 

him that DWM would not be hiring him for the position based on his prior termination and his 

misrepresentation on the release form. DSMF ¶ 49. Mr. Christopher attempted to explain his side 

of the story to Toledo on that call. He was not able to successfully plead his case to her. Pltf.’s 

Resp. to DSMF ¶ 52. 

With Mr. Christopher no longer in consideration for the ECD position, Giavonna Cephas, 

a 42-year-old, was next highest on the referral list. The City used a third-party background check 

contractor to investigate and confirm Cephas had the requisite experience to meet the ECD 

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position’s minimum qualifications.3

 After she cleared the background check, DWM offered her 

the position. She accepted. 

ANALYSIS4

Summary judgment is appropriate only when the moving party shows that “there is no 

genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” 

Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). In deciding a motion for summary judgment, the Court must construe all 

facts and draw all reasonable inferences in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party. Love 

v. JP Cullen & Sons, Inc., 779 F.3d 697, 701 (7th Cir. 2015). If the moving party has demonstrated 

the absence of a disputed material fact, then the burden shifts to the nonmoving party to “provide 

evidence of specific facts creating a genuine dispute.” Carroll v. Lynch, 698 F.3d 561, 564 (7th 

Cir. 2012). 

3

 The parties dispute whether Cephas and Sherman, who are both younger than Mr. 

Christopher, were actually qualified for the position. 

4

 The Court notes that the parties have raised several issues about each other’s Local Rule 

56 statements of facts, responses to each other’s statements of facts, and the admissibility of certain 

evidence on which the parties have relied in setting forth those statements. For the reasons set forth 

below, Mr. Christopher’s failure to adduce sufficient evidence—whether admissible or not—to 

survive summary judgment renders these questions moot. This is not to suggest that evidentiary 

issues and compliance with Local Rule 56.1 are not important. Indeed, they are of extreme 

importance in many cases where a genuine dispute of material fact may or may not exist based on 

the existence and admissibility of certain evidence. Here, however, the Court declines to engage 

these disputes because, even if it ruled in favor of the plaintiff at every turn, there would be no 

change in the ultimate outcome of this case. As a final note on the matter, the purpose of Local 

Rule 56.1 is to streamline the resolution of summary judgment motions by consolidating 

admissible evidence into a roadmap for the Court. Parties should be mindful and judicious when 

objecting to each other’s statements and formulating their own so as not to undermine the Local 

Rule’s underlying purpose. 

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I. Retaliatory Non-Hiring in Contravention of the First Amendment 

Mr. Christopher seeks to hold the City directly liable under § 1983 for retaliating against 

him for exercising his First Amendment rights to free speech and political association when it 

refused to hire him in 2019. The Seventh Circuit has laid out the legal standard for such claims: 

To prove a First Amendment employment retaliation claim under § 

1983, a plaintiff must establish three primary elements. First, the 

plaintiff must show that his speech was constitutionally protected. 

Second, the plaintiff must prove that he suffered an adverse 

employment action as a result of his protected speech that was 

sufficiently adverse so as to deter the exercise of the free speech. 

And third, the plaintiff must present evidence to establish that a 

reasonable jury could find that his speech was a “substantial” or 

“motivating” factor for his adverse employment action. 

Graber v. Clarke, 763 F.3d 888 (7th Cir. 2014) (citations omitted). 

A. Constitutionally Protected Activity

Mr. Christopher claims that the City violated his First Amendment right to free speech and 

political association as a public employee. The political association theory can be dispatched 

easily; that claim fails because, as the City correctly points out, Christopher has set forth no 

competent evidence concerning what his political affiliation actually was, that City officials were 

aware of his political affiliation or made assumptions concerning it, or that the City made its 

decision not to hire him based on his political affiliation.5

 Accordingly, Mr. Christopher cannot 

proceed on that basis. 

Turning to his other First Amendment theory, Mr. Christopher claims that the City was 

retaliating against him for previously complaining about the City’s hiring practices when it refused 

5

 The City also argues that the complaint states no claim for retaliation based on political 

affiliation, arguing that the plaintiff has raised it in this case for the first time on summary 

judgment. The Court need not address the question because it fails regardless of whether the 

plaintiff stated it in his complaint. 

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to hire him for the ECD position in 2019. But to prove a retaliation-against-speech claim, “a public 

employee first must prove that [his] speech is constitutionally protected.” Kubiak v. City of 

Chicago, 810 F.3d 476, 481 (7th Cir. 2016). Without evidence of constitutionally protected speech, 

there can be no constitutional violation. To prove that his speech was constitutionally protected, 

the employee must be able to convince a reasonable factfinder that “(1) [he] made the speech as a 

private citizen, (2) the speech addressed a matter of public concern, and (3) [his] interest in 

expressing that speech was not outweighed by the state’s interests as an employer in promoting 

effective and efficient public service.” Swetlik v. Crawford, 738 F.3d 818, 825 (7th Cir. 2013) 

(internal quotation marks omitted); see also Garcetti v. Ceballos, 547 U.S. 410, 417 (2006) (“[T]he 

First Amendment protects a public employee’s right, in certain circumstances, to speak as a citizen 

addressing matters of public concern.”). “Whether a statement is a matter of public concern is a 

question of law for the court, and we answer this question by examining the content, form, and 

context of the statement.” Bivens v. Trent, 591 F.3d 555, 560 (7th Cir. 2010) (internal quotation 

marks omitted). 

Mr. Christopher claims that the City retaliated against him for “speaking out about political 

discrimination. He was passed over time and again for positions that he was already performing 

and was qualified for.” Pltf.’s Memo (ECF No. 40) at 13. The Seventh Circuit has held that “the 

motive of the speaker is a relevant, though not dispositive, factor because speech will not be 

protected if the only point of the speech was ‘to further some purely private interest.’” Trent, 591 

F.3d at 561 (quoting Kokkinis v. Ivkovich, 185 F.3d 840, 844 (7th Cir. 1999)). Here, Mr. 

Christopher’s statements of facts contain and cite to no evidence setting forth the actual content of 

his complaints to coworkers or supervisors, beyond the mere conclusion that those complaints 

were “about political discrimination.” A read of Mr. Christopher’s Shakman complaint, appended 

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to the City’s memorandum (ECF No. 38-3), reveals that Mr. Christopher’s supposedly protected 

speech was solely about the fact that the City passed Mr. Christopher over for several job openings 

for which he believed he was qualified, contested his unemployment benefits, and held up his 

vacation pay because of his conclusory claims about discriminatory hiring practices. The Shakman

complaint and requested relief are geared entirely toward his own private interest in obtaining the 

positions for which he applied—containing no indication of any motivation related to furthering 

the public interest in preventing politically discriminatory or patronage-related hiring practices by 

the City. The evidence points only toward that conclusion. That the public “may have been 

interested” in Mr. Christopher’s complaints about supposedly political hiring practices “does not 

raise the speech here to the level of public concern.” Id. at 562. As a result, even assuming that the 

City was at least partly motivated not to hire him because of his prior complaints about the City’s 

hiring practices, Mr. Christopher cannot survive summary judgment on his First Amendment 

claim. 

B. Municipal Liability

Even if Mr. Christopher could establish that he suffered a constitutional injury, he cannot 

show that the injury is attributable to the City. The individual government employees who refused 

to hire him, i.e., those who executed the purported adverse employment action, are not defendants 

in this case. The Supreme Court has held that “a local government may not be sued under § 1983 

for an injury inflicted solely by its employees or agents.” Monell v. Department of Social Services, 

436 U.S. 658, 694 (1978). To hold the City liable under § 1983, then, Mr. Christopher must 

establish that his injury is attributable to the City by means other than the doctrine of respondeat 

superior. His injury must stem from an unconstitutional “execution of a government’s policy or 

custom, whether made by its lawmakers or by those whose edicts or acts may fairly be said to 

represent official policy.” Id. The Seventh Circuit has interpreted this to mean that a plaintiff can 

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prevail under Monell by demonstrating the existence of one of the following: “(1) an express policy 

that causes a constitutional deprivation when enforced; (2) a widespread practice that is so 

permanent and well-settled that it constitutes a custom or practice; or (3) an allegation that the 

constitutional injury was caused by a person with final policymaking authority.” First Midwest 

Bank Guardian of Est. of LaPorta v. City of Chicago, 988 F.3d 978, 986 (7th Cir. 2021), cert. 

denied sub nom. First Midwest Bank v. City of Chicago, 142 S. Ct. 389 (2021) (quoting Spiegel v. 

McClintic, 916 F.3d 611, 617 (7th Cir. 2019)). Further, the “plaintiff must also prove that the 

policy or custom demonstrates municipal fault,” by either showing that the municipal action, 

policy, or custom is facially violative of a federal right or showing that, even though “the 

municipality has not directly violated” the plaintiff’s rights, it nevertheless “caused an employee 

to do so” with deliberate indifference to those rights. Id. at 986-87. 

 Mr. Christopher’s constitutional claim against the City must fail because he has not met 

his burden of showing that the evidence can support any viable theory of municipal liability. He 

argues that the City violated his rights through its custom or practice of “seeking approval or 

permission for not hiring someone.” Pltf.’s Resp. (ECF No. 47) at 12. Mr. Christopher claims that 

Martin Wise’s request of Kathleen Doyle, Deputy Commissioner of the City’s Human Resources 

Department, for permission not to hire Mr. Christopher for the ECD position in July 2019, led to 

his constitutional injury. Id. He purports to use this example as evidence of a custom or practice; 

however, one isolated incident is not enough to show it was a custom or practice within the City’s 

hiring processes, let alone one that can give rise to municipal fault (e.g., through deliberate 

indifference). See Daniel v. Cook Cnty., 833 F.3d 728, 734 (7th Cir. 2016) (“We have said in 

general terms that an inmate can meet this burden by offering competent evidence tending to show 

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a general pattern of repeated behavior (i.e., something greater than a mere isolated event).” 

(internal quotation marks omitted)). 

 Mr. Christopher has not asserted any other viable theories of municipal liability under 

Monell or its progeny.6

 Therefore, the City is entitled to summary judgment with regard to the 

political retaliation claim. 

II. Age Discrimination 

The City has also moved for summary judgment on Mr. Christopher’s age discrimination 

claim under the ADEA, 29 U.S.C. § 623(a), and 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Mr. Christopher has responded 

to assert the viability of his age discrimination claim only under his ADEA theory. He was 58 

years old at the time of his application and therefore falls within the ADEA’s protected class of 

those who are 40 years or older at the time of refusal to hire. See 29 U.S.C.A. § 631(a). The City 

does not dispute that he met the minimum qualifications for the position, or that the City ultimately 

refused to hire him. Therefore, he must be able to show the establish the remaining aspect of his 

claim: that the City’s refusal to hire Mr. Christopher was because of his age. See 29 U.S.C. § 

623(a)(1). “[I]n the ADEA context, it’s not enough to show that age was a motivating factor. Mr. 

Christopher must prove that, but for his age, the adverse action would not have occurred,” Martino 

v. MCI Commc'ns Serv., Inc., 574 F.3d 447, 455 (7th Cir. 2009), i.e., the City would have hired 

him if he were young enough. He can accomplish this in two ways: He “may proceed by 

6

 The plaintiff’s memorandum in support of its motion for partial summary judgment 

identifies a City Diversity and Equal Employment Opportunity Policy regarding retaliation that he 

alleges the City employees violated in refusing to hire him. Pltf.’s Memo. (ECF No. 40) at 14. The 

plaintiff did not continue to pursue this argument after the City disputed it in its response 

memorandum, presumably because it is premised on an incorrect interpretation of Monell. The 

policy or custom must itself be constitutionally violative (or some violation must stem directly 

from it) to support municipal liability; a municipal employee’s violation of a governmental policy 

or departure from custom does not in itself support a Monell claim. 

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introducing direct or circumstantial evidence that” the City refused to hire him because of his age, 

Carson v. Lake County, Indiana, 865 F.3d 526 (7th Cir. 2017), or he may proceed under the 

McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792 (1973), burden-shifting framework, which 

involves showing that similarly situated (but younger) applicants were treated more favorably and 

then submitting evidence that the City’s proffered and nondiscriminatory reason for that 

differential treatment was pretextual.7 See Simpson v. Franciscan Alliance, Inc., 827 F.3d 656, 661 

(7th Cir. 2016). “However the plaintiff chooses to proceed, at the summary judgment stage the 

court must consider all admissible evidence to decide whether a reasonable jury could find that the 

plaintiff suffered an adverse action because of her age.” Carson, 865 F.3d at 533. 

Mr. Christopher cannot survive summary judgment on his age discrimination claim. He 

has offered no evidence to show that the City’s stated reason for not hiring him—that he was 

terminated for yelling and using profanity toward his supervisor at 2FM and then not disclosing 

the incident on his background check form when asked to list the reason for his termination—was 

pretextual. Without being able to show any evidence that this legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason 

was pretextual, Mr. Christopher cannot proceed under either standard. (Recall that mixedmotivation theories do not suffice under the ADEA, which is “narrower than Title VII of the Civil 

Rights Act of 1964” in this respect. Carson, 865 F.3d at 532.) Christopher concedes that there is 

no evidence suggesting that City officials involved in the hiring process made any comments about 

7

 The City does not dispute that the plaintiff has met his burden on the first three elements 

of the McDonnell-Douglas burden-shifting framework. The City does, however, dispute that the 

plaintiff is able to use Cephas and Sherman, who are both younger than the plaintiff, as similarly 

situated comparators, primarily because they differ from the plaintiff in that they were never fired 

from the City, much less fired for a disciplinary reason. While this argument is well taken, it is 

unnecessary for the Court to delve too deeply since the plaintiff’s claim cannot proceed regardless 

of whether he proceeds under the more rigid burden-shifting framework of McDonnell-Douglas

or through the more holistic review elucidated in Ortiz v. Werner Enterprises, Inc., 834 F.3d 760 

(7th Cir. 2016). 

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Mr. Christopher’s age. His only argument that age may have been a factor is that the City’s hiring 

officials were aware of the candidates’ dates of birth, were just looking for an excuse not to hire 

him (and to hire someone younger), and found that excuse in his prior termination. That is simply 

not enough. “An employer's knowledge that the plaintiff is a member of a protected class is 

obviously not enough to cast doubt on that employer’s proffered reason for rejecting a candidate.” 

Rabinovitz v. Pena, 89 F.3d 482, 488 (7th Cir. 1996) (holding so in the Title VII context, though 

the same principle applies here). Mr. Christopher also tries to argue that profanity was 

commonplace at 2FM, so not hiring him for using profanity toward West at his old job was 

unreasonable (a “lame” excuse, according to him). But elsewhere Mr. Christopher argues that Wise 

did not contact any of the individuals involved in Mr. Christopher’s termination to verify what 

transpired in 2013. Therefore, if anything, the fact that profanity was commonplace at 2FM would 

go toward whether Mr. Christopher’s use of profanity was a pretextual reason for firing him in 

2013, not whether the non-hiring for that reason (and that his disclosure regarding the termination 

on his background-check form was interpreted as misleading) in 2019 was pretextual. In sum, Mr. 

Christopher has not succeeded in adducing sufficient evidence to survive summary judgment on 

his age discrimination claim. As a result, his age discrimination claim also fails. 

* * * 

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For the foregoing reasons, the defendant City of Chicago’s motion for summary judgment 

is granted, and the plaintiff Ronald Christopher’s is denied. Judgment will be entered in favor of 

the defendant City of Chicago on both counts. 

Dated: December 15, 2022 John J. Tharp, Jr. 

 United States District Judge 

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