Case Name: Dewey WATKINS, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. ELECTRONIC DATA SYSTEMS CORPORATION, Defendant-Appellee
Court: United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
Jurisdiction: United States
Decision Date: 2004-11-02
Citations: 111 F. App'x 839
Docket Number: No. 03-6353
Parties: Dewey WATKINS, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. ELECTRONIC DATA SYSTEMS CORPORATION, Defendant-Appellee.
Judges: 
Reporter: West's Federal Appendix
Volume: 111
Pages: 839–839

Head Matter:
Dewey WATKINS, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. ELECTRONIC DATA SYSTEMS CORPORATION, Defendant-Appellee.
No. 03-6353.
United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.
Nov. 2, 2004.
Robert L. Delaney, Delaney & Withers, Nashville, TN, for Plaintiff-Appellant.
Robert M. Wolff, Michael T. Pearson, Duvin, Cahn & Hutton, Cleveland, OH, for Defendant-Appellee.
Before NELSON and COOK, Circuit Judges, and WEBER, District Judge.
The Honorable Herman J. Weber, United States District Judge for the Southern District of Ohio, sitting by designation.

Opinion:
PER CURIAM.
The plaintiff, Dewey Watkins, was fired when, in violation of an express directive from his supervisor, he asked the State of Tennessee to cancel a computer access code that had been assigned to him and was being used (with the supervisor's approval) by another authorized employee. The code provided access to confidential records maintained for Tennessee's Medicaid program.
Invoking Tennessee law, Mr. Watkins sued his former employer, Electronic Data Systems Corporation ("EDS"), for retaliatory discharge. His theory was that the company's sharing of the access code breached the confidentiality of patients' records, in violation of Tennessee law and public policy, and that EDS had fired him for refusing to participate in this "illegal" conduct. Mr. Watkins neither alleged nor presented proof that the access code had been used by anyone other than an authorized user for legitimate business purposes.
The district court entered summary judgment for EDS. The court held that the sharing of the access code with another authorized user did not violate any statute, regulation, or public policy of the state of Tennessee, and that Watkins had no protected right to obtain the cancellation of the code in violation of his supervisor's orders. Mr. Watkins perfected a timely appeal.
Upon de novo review, we conclude that the material facts of the case are not in dispute; that the district court applied Tennessee law to the facts correctly; and that for our court to prepare a detailed opinion would be duplicative of the district court's efforts and would serve no useful jurisprudential purpose. Accordingly, the challenged judgment is AFFIRMED on the basis of the district court's well-reasoned opinion.