Opinion ID: 75882
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The District Court's Grant of Summary Judgment to Tenneco

Text: 8 After the acerbic discovery period ended, Tenneco moved for the district court to grant summary judgment in its favor. In moving for summary judgment, Tenneco argued that, with respect to the denied promotions in 1987 and 1991, Thomas's claims for back pay and damages were foreclosed by the statute of limitations. Tenneco also asserted that Thomas did not have evidence sufficient to demonstrate that he was qualified for the supervisor positions that he had sought. Finally, Tenneco alleged that Thomas could not prove that Tenneco acted with discriminatory intent in granting the promotions to other employees. 9 In response to the motion, Munson filed the Plaintiff's Response to Defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment and the Plaintiff's Statement of Material Facts, the latter of which included several attached exhibits. As exhibits, Munson submitted several affidavits, including the affidavits of Thomas and of Helen Blair. 4 Both of the affidavits contained ad hominem attacks directed at opposing counsel. With respect to the Thomas affidavit filed by Munson, paragraph 12 failed to discuss the underlying promotions claims at issue in the case. The paragraph instead contained Thomas's demeaning description of opposing counsel during the two times that he deposed Thomas. For instance, in reference to opposing counsel, Thomas stated that he was uncomfortable being around that type of a white person during his deposition. Thomas Aff. at 5 (R3-96 Exh. A). Thomas also remarked therein that opposing counsel spit out and snarled his words at the deposition, and that opposing counsel was a little man sp[]ewing venom. Id. at 6. Furthermore, Thomas alleged that persons attending the deposition were laughing at opposing counsel, given that his hair was standing up on his head, he was biting on a pencil and he was turning red. Id. 5 10 The Blair affidavit filed by Munson contained similar vitriol directed at opposing counsel. In paragraph 5 of the affidavit, Blair described a conversation she had with Munson after a meeting between a Tenneco manager and several African-American employees who had commenced suit against Tenneco. During the meeting, the manager and the employees allegedly discussed the issue of retaliation. Blair stated in her affidavit that: 11 Ms. Munson ... told me that she would notify the attorney for the company to advise him that he would do well to tell his clients to back off, and that there should be no more of these meetings. I told Ms. Munson the little attorney seemed to be part of the problem, and he probably put them up to this. 12 Ms. Munson said maybe so since he is trying to win at all cost, and he apparently has grossly under estimated [sic] us.... 13 Blair Aff. at 3 (R3-96 Exh. E). Thus, as with the Thomas affidavit, the Blair affidavit served in part as a vehicle for showering opposing counsel with invective. 14 Other documents submitted in response to Tenneco's summary judgment motion also contained ad hominem attacks directed at opposing counsel. One such document filed by Munson was the Plaintiff's Amended Supplement to Plaintiff's Response to Defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment (the Plaintiff's Amended Supplement). In the Plaintiff's Amended Supplement, Munson responded to opposing counsel's argument that many of the plaintiff's affidavits were for witnesses who had not been properly identified in mandatory interrogatories. She responded by asserting that opposing counsel was making this argument because he ha[d] failed to do his job. R4-104-1. Munson, moreover, referred to an accusation made by opposing counsel that her personal attacks upon him were inappropriate 6 as an example of psycho babbling, id. at 3, and she remarked that opposing counsel was just `grip[]ing' because the plaintiff has out smarted [sic] him by not giving him a `road map' of his evidence, id. at 4. She also maintained that opposing counsel did not have the right to judge African Americans because African Americans often process information differently than white individuals[, and] [t]he distinction between rude and racist conduct is often made by a split judgment that is not developed by whites. Id. at 3-4 n. 4. She further contended: 15 [D]efendant's counsel is basically urging this court to align itself with him, and repudiate African Americans' constitutional rights to call perceived racism like they see it. Accordingly, plaintiff respectfully requests that should this court have the need to serve as a witness for the white defendant employer ... it rec[use] itself. 16 Id. at 3-4 (internal footnotes and parenthesis omitted). 7 Finally, Munson, in explaining why opposing counsel's conduct warranted the remarks made about him, insinuated that he risked physical attack: 17 One of the other witnesses was on the verge of slapping [opposing counsel] during these depositions. During a recess, plaintiff's counsel had to call the witness's wife to convince the witness not to go into the deposition and engage in violence against [opposing counsel]. The witness was upset at the tone, the racism and the sarcasm that [opposing] counsel had been using [] with all the African American plaintiffs and their counsel (plaintiff's counsel agreed with the witness assessment of the conduct but not the self-help remedy). 18 Id. at 2-3 n. 2 (internal record citation omitted). 19 Another document filed by Munson that contained ad hominem attacks was the Declaration of Beatrice Mercer, 8 which was attached as an exhibit to the Plaintiff's Amended Supplement. In the declaration, Mercer disclosed a conversation she had with Munson and Matthew Williams 9 following the morning session of Williams's deposition that had been conducted by opposing counsel. Mercer stated generally that, during their conversation, Williams had told her about opposing counsel's racist conduct, Mercer Decl. at 2 (R4-104 Exh. A), and she asserted that Williams had told her that opposing counsel's behavior and mannerism[s] indicated that he hated `blacks,' id. at 3. Furthermore, Mercer related that Williams commented to her that opposing counsel looked pretty silly and that he was willing to `kick his ass' if opposing counsel did anything to Munson. Id. Mercer's declaration, in fact, contained a racist comment: Mercer remarked therein that, during her conversation with Munson and Williams, Munson told her opposing counsel had no authority over her and [that] she was unimpressed with him or his race. Id. 20 In addition to these statements, Mercer described her impressions of opposing counsel when he deposed Blair and David Ward in the Ward case. She opined: 21 It was like [opposing counsel] could not stand to look at us, or how dare you group of low-based blacks challenge good white people. His facial expressions and body language reminded me of a picture of the Grand Wizard of the KKK (the witnesses gave [opposing counsel] that knick name [sic]). He would spit out his words to us like we were trash. Id. at 4. She also described her impressions of opposing counsel at her own deposition, remarking that [h]e was snarling his words, raising his voice, squinting his eyes and apparently trying to intimidate me. Id. at 3. Indeed, she went so far as to comment that she contemplated going home and getting [her] son to confront opposing counsel because he had disrespected... and talked down to her. Id. In sum, as these examples illustrate, Mercer's declaration, filed by Munson, was overflowing with inflammatory statements directed at opposing counsel. 10 22 After Munson filed these documents, opposing counsel filed the Defendant's Motion to Exclude Affidavit Testimony Submitted by Plaintiff (the Defendant's Motion to Exclude). In the motion, opposing counsel argued, among other things, that paragraph 12 of the Thomas affidavit and the entire Blair affidavit should be stricken from the record. The Mercer declaration, he maintained, also should be stricken in its entirety because its contents were nothing more than an irrelevant, self-serving, unsupported, and inappropriate personal attack on defense counsel for which Ms. Mercer and her attorney should be sanctioned. R4-105-14. Opposing counsel called for sanctions against Munson at another point in the motion as well, asserting that sanctions were appropriate based on the pattern of continuing abusive tactics employed by her. Id. at 5. 23 Munson then filed the Plaintiff's Response to Defendant's Motion to Exclude Affidavit Testimony Submitted by Plaintiff (the Plaintiff's Response to Defendant's Motion to Exclude). With reference to the alleged abusive tactics employed by her and her client, she retorted that [n]either plaintiff nor his counsel has the slightest idea as to what [opposing] counsel is referring (plaintiff's description of the white defense counsel's repugnant racial conduct is supported by the other plaintiffs and/or their witnesses). R4-107-4 (internal footnote omitted). Furthermore, in response to opposing counsel's contention that the allegations of racist conduct on his part were unsupported, Munson commented in footnote 2: 24 [Opposing] counsel's bald denial even if genuine does not mean that his conduct was not racially offensive. Plaintiff believes the same as one of [the] Sixth Circuit's most learned jurist[s], ... who declared in an interview[,] A lot of white people don't understand that what they are doing is racist. Who is plaintiff to believe on the issue of racism, a learned, Sixth Circuit, African-American appellate jurist or a white defense counsel trying to win a case? Plaintiff's counsel certainly would make her copy of the foregoing available to [opposing] counsel. It appears as if he is uninformed as to the pervasiveness of the race problem not only in the judicial system but also in America. 25 Id. at n. 2 (internal citation omitted). 26 Subsequent to Munson's filing of the response, the district court granted summary judgment to Tenneco. The court also denied the Defendant's Motion to Exclude, stating that the objections to the affidavits would be considered as objections to testimony as part of the court's summary judgment analysis. 11 The district court concluded that Thomas's claims for any relief other than equitable relief for the denied promotions in 1987 and 1991 were barred by the applicable statute of limitations period. As to Thomas's ability to obtain equitable relief for the 1987 and 1991 claims, the court held that Thomas could not obtain declaratory relief because he was seeking to have past conduct declared discriminatory. Thomas could not obtain injunctive relief, the district court further held, because he already had obtained the relief sought in 1999, namely, a permanent supervisory position at Tenneco. Furthermore, with regard to Thomas's claim based on his denied 1998 promotion, the court ruled that Thomas had not made out a prima facie case of discrimination under the McDonnell Douglas/Burdine 12 burden-shifting formula because he had failed to show that he was qualified at that time for a Tenneco supervisory position. For these reasons, the district court granted Tenneco's motion for summary judgment and entered judgment in favor of Tenneco and against Thomas. Thomas then challenged the district court's summary judgment decision in an appeal separate from the instant one. After holding oral argument, we affirmed pursuant to Eleventh Circuit Rule 36-1. Thomas v. Tenneco Packaging Co., 268 F.3d 1066 (11th Cir.2001) (unpublished table decision), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 122 S.Ct. 2295, 152 L.Ed.2d 1053 (2002). 13 27