Opinion ID: 775498
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Rebutting the Plaintiff's First Amendment Retaliation Claim

Text: 74 Because Cockrel has successfully established for purposes of the summary judgment stage the three elements of her First Amendment retaliation claim, the burden of persuasion shifts to the defendants. As stated earlier, to defeat the plaintiff's claim at trial, the defendants must show by a preponderance of the evidence that they would have terminated Cockrel even had she not engaged in constitutionally protected activity. Leary, 228 F.3d at 737. To defeat plaintiff's claim on a motion for summary judgment, however, a substantially higher hurdle must be surpassed, particularly where, as is the case here, the moving party bears the ultimate burden of persuasion on this issue at trial. 11 James William Moore et al., Moore's Federal Practice §56.13[1], at 56-138 (3d ed. 2000) (stating that, if the moving party also bears the burden of persuasion at trial, the moving party's initial summary judgment burden is higher in that it must show that the record contains evidence satisfying the burden of persuasion and that the evidence is so powerful that no reasonable jury would be free to disbelieve it.). To merit summary judgment in their favor, the defendants may not simply bring forth enough evidence to allow a jury to find that they would have terminated Cockrel regardless of her speech. Rather, in reviewing a motion for summary judgment, we must view the evidence and draw all reasonable inferences in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party, Matsushita, 475 U.S. at 587, and [s]ummary judgment in favor of the party with the burden of persuasion ... is inappropriate when the evidence is susceptible of different interpretations or inferences by the trier of fact. Hunt v. Cromartie, 526 U.S. 541, 553 (1999). Thus, because plaintiff has established the elements of her claim for First Amendment retaliation, summary judgment for the defendants is proper only if the evidence is such that everyreasonable juror would conclude that the defendants have met their burden of showing that Cockrel would have been terminated even had she not spoken to her class about the merits of industrial hemp. 75 In the July 15, 1997 termination letter sent by Superintendent Mooneyhan to Cockrel, seventeen reasons were given as the basis for the school district's decision to discharge her. J.A. at 51-55. Among the litany of reasons offered by the defendants for Cockrel's discharge were: her calling Principal Slate names in front of staff members and students; 8 her failure to teach the school's mandatory Just Think curriculum; her persistent failure to follow the school's Title I program; her inappropriate language and displays of anger in class; and her general failure to cooperate with other members of the Simpsonville school community, a point which we have already discussed in detail. There is no question that Cockrel's conduct, if it did in fact occur as the defendants allege, was completely inappropriate. Furthermore, we have no doubt that conduct of this nature can serve as adequate grounds for an employee's termination. Despite this, however, after viewing all the evidence in the record in the light most favorable to Cockrel, we do not believe that the defendants have met their significant burden of showing that every reasonable juror would conclude that, even had Cockrel not spoken to her students about industrial hemp, she would have been terminated in any event. 76 Several pieces of evidence weigh against granting defendants' summary judgment motion. First, Cockrel testified in her deposition that, at the beginning of the 1996-97 school year following Harrelson's first visit to her class, she spoke with Superintendent Mooneyhan about the possibility of Harrelson making a second visit to Simpsonville Elementary. Cockrel claimed that, during the course of this conversation, Mooneyhan told her that it would not be in her best interests if Harrelson made any more visits to her class. J.A. at 104-05 (Cockrel Dep.). While Mooneyhan denies ever making such a statement, Mooneyhan Dep. I at 65, when reviewing defendant's motion for summary judgment, we are required to view the evidence in the light most favorable to Cockrel, the nonmoving party. This, alone, creates a material fact issue over the extent to which defendants' decision to discharge Cockrel was motivated by her decision to bring industrial hemp advocates to class. 77 Other, more circumstantial, evidence also weighs in favor of allowing Cockrel to proceed to trial on her retaliation claim. As noted earlier, Principal Slate initiated early evaluations of Cockrel in the 1996-97 school year following Harrelson's first visit on the last day of the prior school year. In addition, Superintendent Mooneyhan's decision to conduct an investigation into Cockrel's conduct was based solely on the parents' and teachers' complaint letters he received following the initial Harrelson visit. There is no evidence in the record that any news of the improper conduct alleged in Cockrel's termination letter, much of which occurred well before Harrelson set foot on the grounds of Simpsonville Elementary, had ever been relayed to the Superintendent before the decision to investigate Cockrel had been made, nor is there any evidence that Cockrel had been disciplined by any school administrator for this conduct before Harrelson arrived on the scene. While many of the allegations made against Cockrel would, if true, amount to serious misconduct on her part, the fact that she was not disciplined for any of this behavior, nor did the Superintendent know of it, until after Harrelson visited and various members of the school community voiced their displeasure with the presentation, leads to a genuine issue of material fact concerning the defendants' assertion that Cockrel would have been fired regardless of her decision to speak on the environmental benefits of industrial hemp. 78 Also telling is the summative evaluation itself, which Principal Slate testified was the basis upon which he recommended to Mooneyhan that Cockrel be fired, and which Mooneyhan admitted was a factor in his ultimate decision to discharge Cockrel. Mooneyhan Dep. II at 150. As evidence of Cockrel's allegedly deficient performance in several categories of evaluation, Principal Slate attached numerous documents to the evaluation. Among these documents were several letters from staff and parents criticizing Cockrel's decision to speak on industrial hemp, as well as a position statement adopted by the Simpsonville PTA recommending that Cockrel no longer be permitted to teach at that school based on her conduct associated with the hemp presentations. While in the documents appended to the summative evaluation there is evidence of Cockrel engaging in inappropriate behavior apart from her participation in any industrial hemp presentations, we do not believe that, based on the totality of the evidence in this case, every reasonable juror would conclude that Cockrel would have been terminated notwithstanding her constitutionally protected speech. 79 The defendants cite to this circuit's decision in Langford v. Lane, 921 F.2d 677 (6th Cir. 1991), as support for their contention that they have met their burden of rebutting Cockrel's retaliation claim. We believe, however, that Langford is distinguishable. In Langford, a nursing home employee was fired after engaging in constitutionally protected activity in speaking about an employment dispute in front of the County Board of Commissioners. Langford, 921 F.2d at 678-79. The day before the plaintiff in Langford was scheduled to speak, her supervisor (Lane) asked the plaintiff (Langford) to discuss why Langford was so hostile to her (Langford had earlier insulted Lane in front of co-workers) and what Langford planned to say to the Board the next evening. Langford twice refused to engage in discussion, once in front of other employees. After Langford refused to speak with her, Lane asked her supervisor if Lane could fire Langford based on this insubordinate conduct. Lane's supervisor told her that, because he had not witnessed the allegedly insubordinate conduct, he could not make the termination decision for her. Rather than discharge Langford, Lane left a note for Langford to meet with her the following day, the day Langford was scheduled to speak to the Board. This time Langford did agree to meet with Lane, though Langford asked Lane to postpone their meeting until the day after Langford spoke to the Board. Despite their agreement, Langford failed to attend her scheduled meeting with Lane. Langford was then fired. 80 On review of the district court's grant of summary judgment to the government employer, this court held that the evidence was strong enough for a reasonable jury to state that the employee's speech motivated, at least in part, the defendant's decision to discharge her. Id. at 683. Nevertheless, this court then held that, based on the Langford's rank insubordination in insulting Lane in front of co-workers and refusing to discuss her employment dispute with Lane despite Lane's requests to do so, the defendants would have terminated Langford regardless of her protected speech. Id. at 683-84. 81 Although the defendants in the case at bar have as much evidence of insubordination and other misconduct upon which to base their decision to discharge as did the defendants in Langford, it is less clear in the current case that the defendants would have fired Cockrel even had she not engaged in protected speech. First, in Langford, this court acknowledged that, aside from the temporal proximity between Lane's requests to speak with Langford about their problems and Langford's scheduled speaking engagement with the Board of Commissioners, plaintiff had brought forth no evidence showing that Lane was trying to intimidate her into not speaking in front of the Board, nor was there any additional evidence aside from the temporal proximity of the termination and her speech which indicated that the defendants had retaliated against her for speaking. Id. at 682. In the current case, Cockrel's testimony regarding the warning she received from Mooneyhan, as well as the materials attached to the summative evaluation, are pieces of evidence that cast more doubt on the defendants' motives in terminating Cockrel than existed in Langford. 82 In addition, in Langford, plaintiff's supervisor appeared ready and willing to terminate plaintiff as soon as plaintiff refused to speak with her about the problems the two were having. Langford was then swiftly terminated after she failed to attend a meeting with Lane in which they were to discuss their dispute. In the current case, there is less evidence that the defendants were sufficiently motivated by Cockrel's conduct apart from her decision to speak when they made their decision to terminate her. In this case, although Mooneyhan cited seventeen charges constituting the basis for Cockrel's termination, several of the proffered reasons provide a less than compelling basis for termination. For example, Mooneyhan cited Cockrel's frequent use of the school's telephone for non-school-related business, her failure to prepare adequate lesson plans for substitute teachers, and her failure to follow the school's visitors policy for the first Harrelson visit. For each of these charges, there is no evidence in the record that Cockrel had ever been disciplined or reprimanded in any way for these violations prior to their inclusion as bases for her termination. Furthermore, while many of the more serious allegations detailed in the termination letter (i.e., calling Principal Slate names and inappropriate displays of anger in class) occurred well before Harrelson came to Simpsonville to speak on industrial hemp, there is no evidence that this misconduct was ever acted upon by any school administrator until after Harrelson made his initial visit. Based on this evidence, we do not believe that the defendants have met their burden at the summary judgment stage of showing that their decision to discharge Cockrel would have been made regardless of her decision to engage in constitutionally protected speech. 83 We are well aware that Cockrel's decision to speak cannot immunize her from an adverse employment decision arising out of inappropriate workplace behavior unrelated to her protected speech. Similarly, an employer is not immunized from its decision to terminate an employee based on her speech simply because that employee has engaged in other conduct that could have constituted legitimate grounds for discharge. Rather, on review of a defendant's motion for summary judgment, if the plaintiff has made out the elements of her First Amendment retaliation claim, we must be confident that the defendant's decision to terminate the plaintiff was not based in part upon the plaintiff's decision to speak. In this case, the defendants have not met this burden, and we believe that a genuine issue of material facts exists from which a reasonable jury could conclude that Cockrel would not have been terminated had she not engaged in constitutionally protected activity. Thus, this matter should be resolved at trial rather than at the summary judgment stage.