Opinion ID: 470317
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Linda E. Johnson

Text: 18 Johnson was hired as a secretary on July 1, 1978. She was the only black female then employed by the Agency. To illustrate the atmosphere in which she worked, she introduced evidence that the Agency separated its staff by race. Thigpen, who was then an administrative assistant, stated in an affidavit filed in connection with an EEOC investigation and acknowledged by him at the trial that, in February 1979, Ms. Charlotte Callen, the Agency's deputy director, asked him to take Ms. Johnson as his secretary in exchange for a white female secretary who had been assigned to him. Thigpen agreed to the swap although this appeared to him to be an attempt to separate the staff by race. 19 Johnson contends that later in 1979 the Agency created two new positions with the classification Assistant Planner and offered the positions to two male employees, one white and one black. The job openings were not posted and other employees were not advised that the positions existed. Johnson learned of the positions only after they had been filled. The Agency maintains that these were not new positions but were merely assignments of additional duties to the two men, without additional pay or change of job title. Some of the Agency's correspondence, however, characterized the males' appointment as promotions. 20 Upon learning of the assignments, Johnson protested to the Agency director that she should have received a promotion to Assistant Planner and complained that she had been denied it because of her sex. In March 1979 she filed a charge of discrimination with the EEOC. The EEOC ultimately found that Johnson was qualified for the position of Assistant Planner while at least one of the men was not, and that the Agency had violated the state merit promotion policy in promoting the males. 21 Johnson asserts that she began to be harassed after she filed her complaint. As an example she testified about an episode in which she resisted an instruction from Allen Torrance, a white male superior to her, on the basis that he was discriminating against her in favor of white secretaries. Torrance sent a memorandum to the Deputy Director complaining of Johnson's insubordination. Thigpen, to whom Johnson was then assigned as secretary, responded to the memo expressing dismay at this attempt to harass Miss Johnson as has been done in the past. Thigpen stated in the affidavit that there seemed to have been an organized effort by white female Agency employees, including the Deputy Director, to harass Johnson so as to get her to resign. He also related that Torrance told Thigpen that he, Torrance, would do whatever he could or use any influence he had to get Johnson terminated. Despite this incident, the Deputy Director promptly thereafter assigned Johnson to work for Torrance. 22 Johnson also alleges that, after she complained of discrimination, the Agency audited her use of the WATS telephone line and asked her to reimburse the Agency for personal calls when other employees, who also made personal calls on the line, were not asked for reimbursement. 23 In May 1979 the federal government notified the Agency that its funds would be cut off at the end of the month. The Governor appointed William McCain as Acting Director of the Agency and instructed him to do whatever was necessary to get federal financing restored. The Atlanta NHTSA office, which controlled the federal funds, ordered McCain to reduce the Agency staff from 20 to 16 persons. McCain discharged two white males, one black male, and Johnson. He testified that he selected Johnson because Thigpen no longer needed a secretary, a fact confirmed by Thigpen at trial, that he personally made the decision, and that he was not influenced by her race or sex. McCain did not explain why he selected Johnson, who was classified as a Secretary 4, rather than a white female clerical employee, who was classified as a Clerical 3 and who had less seniority than Johnson. 24 The Agency contends that the duties of the clerical employee were different from Johnson's. Their job descriptions were indeed different, as were their classifications, but Johnson testified that she sometimes substituted for the clerical worker and that she could do her job. The record contains no evidence about the relative pay of the two positions, and no testimony about the actual requirements of the two jobs or their relative rank. In any event, Johnson was not offered the clerical position as an alternative to termination. 25 In June 1980, Johnson was offered reinstatement to her secretarial job but declined it. She testified that she had accepted another job, and would not return to work for the Agency as a secretary, but would accept reemployment in one of the other jobs she had applied for. 26 The magistrate made no finding concerning whether the appointment of the male employees as Assistant Planners constituted the filling of a vacancy or whether their designation was a promotion. He simply found that Johnson had never applied for the post of Assistant Planner and thereby failed to make a prima facie case of sex discrimination. Nor did the magistrate find whether the selection of Johnson for discharge rather than the less senior clerical employee was discriminatory. He concluded that Johnson had made a prima facie case of discriminatory discharge, but that the Agency had articulated a legitimate non-discriminatory reason for her termination, which he did not specify and which she had failed to prove to be a pretext for discrimination.