Opinion ID: 537698
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Employment Hopes Crushed

Text: 5 Tina Wilson, a black female, was hired in February 1983. She worked in the Company's plant as a machine operator producing one-liter plastic bottles used to contain soft drinks. On April 22, 1983, Tina Wilson and a white machine operator, Susan Gillespie, were laid off because of a surplus inventory of plastic containers. The layoff was ordered by Windholtz. At the same time Donald Hartwell, a white male machine operator, was transferred to a different job at another of the Company's plants. 6 The supervisors of both Wilson and Gillespie testified that Windholtz told them that the layoffs were temporary and that both employees would be called back when production resumed. Windholtz, John Shurman, the President of the Company, and John Slocum, Executive Vice-President, however, all testified that the Company did not have a policy or practice of recalling laid off employees. The Company hired by placing signs outside the office, employing walkins, placing newspaper advertisements, or by using temporary placement services. According to Slocum, laid off employees were not barred from their jobs, but they did need to reapply. 7 Both of the white employees (Hartwell who had been transferred to another division, and Gillespie, who had been laid off) ultimately returned to the plant. Hartwell was transferred back to the plant two weeks after the layoff. It is unclear precisely when Gillespie was rehired. When the line that Hartwell, Gillespie, and Wilson had worked on returned to full capacity, another employee, a white female, was hired to fill Wilson's former job. The trial court found that Wilson, along with Gillespie, had been laid off but that in the context of the Company's employment policies, being laid off was equivalent to being fired or terminated because there was no policy of recalling former employees. The judge also determined that there was no entitlement to be called back to work and that Wilson had never been told by anyone with authority to set labor policy that she would be recalled to work. 8 The court concluded that because Wilson presented direct evidence of discrimination, the Company had the burden of proving by a preponderance of the evidence that it would have decided not to rehire Wilson even in the absence of any discriminatory motive. The court held that this burden was met on the simple ground that the Company did not have a recall policy. This finding was based on the theory that the Company fired (laid off) and then rehired former employees and did not recall them. 4 The court held that a recall policy was a necessary precondition in this case for Title VII protection to apply because of the terms, conditions, or privileges of employment language in the statute. 5 Thus the court held that because the defendant had no policy or practice of recalling employees who were previously let go, the defendant has demonstrated by a preponderance of the evidence that Tina Wilson would not have been recalled even if she were white. 9 The EEOC appeals the determination that Wilson was not racially discriminated against and supports the trial court's decision that the work place was racially hostile. The Company appeals the injunction and the determination that the work place was racially hostile and supports the decision that Tina Wilson was not discriminated against. 10