Opinion ID: 201133
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Deficient Jury Form

Text: 58 Despite the fact that defendants asserted a Mt. Healthy defense and the court provided an instruction on that defense, the jury verdict form did not reflect the law under Mt. Healthy. Instead, the form asked only the following questions as to liability with respect to each plaintiff: 59 Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence: 60 1. That the Plaintiff engaged in constitutionally-protected political activity, a form of free speech, as defined in this court's instructions? 61 .... 62 2. That such protected political activity by the Plaintiff was a substantial or motivating factor in the Defendants' decision to politically discriminate against the Plaintiff? 63 .... 64 3. That the Defendants' acts were the proximate or legal cause of damages sustained by Plaintiff? 65 .... 66 6. [As to Fuentes and Diaz,] [t]hat the Defendants acted with malice or with reckless indifference to the Plaintiff's federally-protected rights.... 67
68 A verdict form must be reasonably capable of an interpretation that would allow the jury to address all factual issues essential to the judgment. Sheek, 235 F.3d at 699 (internal quotation marks omitted). To determine whether the issues were fairly presented to the jury, we examine the court's instructions and the wording of the verdict form as a whole. Id.; Johnson v. Teamsters Local 559, 102 F.3d 21, 28 (1st Cir.1996). We review the court's instructions de novo, unless the objection to the instructions was not preserved, in which case our review is for plain error only. Gray, 289 F.3d at 133; see Reynolds v. Green, 184 F.3d 589, 594 (6th Cir.1999). 69 There is a threshold issue of whether defendants waived their objection to the jury form. Defense counsel represented to us at oral argument that he saw the verdict form for the first time when it was read and explained to the jurors at the end of the charge. Plaintiffs do not dispute that. 5 Defendants immediately objected to the form on the ground that it did not include a question about the Mt. Healthy defense — about whether defendants would have taken the challenged personnel actions anyway because the appointments violated Puerto Rico law. The district court rejected defendants' objection and stated that the instructions on the affirmative defense had been repeated at least three times in the charge and that those instructions were very clear. The court also stated that the second question on the jury form addressed defendants' concern because it required a finding that plaintiffs' political activity was a substantial or motivating factor. For reasons described earlier, this explanation was insufficient. 70 Where a Mt. Healthy defense has been presented we suggest that, to the extent it may not be a common practice, district courts use a verdict form that has at least one question explicitly addressed to that defense. We also suggest that proposed verdict forms always be shared with counsel and discussed together with the proposed jury instructions before the jury charge and explanation of the verdict form in open court. Here, the deficiency in the form could have been avoided altogether had the district court followed these suggested procedures. 71 Defendants had an opportunity to provide a draft jury form to the district court, which they did not take. They also had the opportunity to request that the district court provide them with a copy of the form in advance of its explanation to the jury; again, they did not request it. By the same token (and taking defendants' representation as accurate), it would have been better practice for the district court to review the form with counsel before explaining it to the jurors. 6 72 When the district court told defense counsel that it was disinclined to substitute a new form or question, defendants could and should have requested supplemental jury instructions addressed to any possible jury confusion. For example, defendants could have requested that the jury be instructed that even if it found that political discrimination was a motivating factor, it could not on that basis alone award damages without first addressing the Mt. Healthy defense. The jury could have been instructed that if it found that the corrective actions would have been taken against plaintiffs in any event, then under Mt. Healthy, it could not go on to damages. Defendants did not request any such instructions. It is reasonable to infer, however, from the colloquy between court and counsel in the record, that the district court would have rejected such a request. 73 In light of the peculiar circumstances giving rise to the deficiency in the form, this case does not fit neatly into the usual doctrine of waiver. So we proceed to ask, on this record, whether there was a realistic prospect of jury confusion on the Mt. Healthy issue. 74
75 In response to defense counsel's protestation about the jury form, the court stated, erroneously in our view, that to answer the second verdict form question yes, the jury would need to have rejected the Mt. Healthy defense. We repeat the court's instructions on the second verdict form question: 76 Second, do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that such protected political activity by the plaintiff was a substantial or motivating factor in the defendants' decision to politically discriminate against the plaintiff? 77 For the reasons that follow, we agree with defendants that the form was not adequate and that it had the potential to mislead the jury. 78 We start with this observation: defendants' illegality-of-appointment argument was far from frivolous. Defendants were able to point to specific alleged violations of Bank regulations for the personnel actions taken during the review period as to each of the employee plaintiffs. But it is also true that some of the alleged violations could have been seen by the jury as involving technical niceties that might normally have been overlooked. Yet other alleged violations were clearly more serious — for example, the conversions of the two positions from policy-making status to career status when, allegedly, there was neither a change in the nature of the positions nor in the Bank's structure that would have justified the conversions. 79 The theme of plaintiffs' opening statement was that the real motivation for the personnel actions that were taken against the employee plaintiffs was that they were NPP members and that defendants' stated reasons for the actions were untrue and trivial. 80 The theme of the opening statement for the Bank and the two individuals in their official capacities was that they had followed the rules and regulations of Puerto Rico law without exception and that the personnel actions that the former NPP regime had taken as to each of the plaintiffs were unlawful. The theme of the opening statement for Fuentes and Diaz in their individual capacities was that plaintiffs were dismissed or changed from their positions because they were illegally appointed to those positions, and they did not comply with the law. Indeed, the argument was that it was plaintiffs' party, the NPP, that had discriminated — that no one from the PDP party had been assigned to any positions by the prior administration during the moratorium period. But if a PDP party member had been unlawfully appointed during the review period, the defense argued, then the new administration would have taken corrective action against that person due to the violation of Puerto Rico law. 81 In his closing argument, plaintiffs' counsel told the jury that they would be instructed by the court that even if plaintiffs 82 had been wrongly appointed and wrongly transferred, if it was motivated by politics, you have to find for plaintiffs. In other words, it wouldn't even matter if, as they claimed, these plaintiffs had been fired ... because the prior appointment had been wrong. Even if that was so, if you decide that politics was a motivating factor, you must find for plaintiffs. 83 As that portion of the closing demonstrates, plaintiffs' case was tried on a theory of causation directly in conflict with Mt. Healthy. Their theory was that even if defendants would have taken the disputed actions anyway because the plaintiffs' appointments violated Puerto Rico law, that fact was irrelevant if political discrimination was a motivating factor in the decision. This argument fundamentally misunderstands Mt. Healthy. 7 84 The court correctly instructed the jury that plaintiffs first had to show that their protected political activity was a substantial or motivating factor for the disputed personnel actions. The court also instructed the jury that the burden then shifted to defendants to show that they would have made the same decisions based on some other reason ... standing alone and in the absence of political discrimination. 8 This second instruction was at odds with the jury form, which did not provide any question addressed to whether defendants had carried their burden. And although not technically incorrect by itself, that second instruction became susceptible to an incorrect interpretation by the jury when considered in conjunction with the jury form. 85 Because there was no question on the jury form about whether defendants had carried their two part burden under Mt. Healthy, the jurors might have thought that if they answered the first two question on the form yes — i.e., that there was protected political activity and that it was a substantial or motivating factor in defendants' decisions — then those findings alone could or even must lead to an affirmative finding on question three — that defendants' acts were the proximate or legal cause of damages sustained by Plaintiff — and thus that the affirmative defense was irrelevant. That understanding of the form was consistent with a plausible, though incorrect, interpretation of the court's instruction that defendants had to show that they would have taken the same actions in the absence of political discrimination. Considered in conjunction with the absence of guidance about the Mt. Healthy defense on the jury form, it becomes apparent that the jurors could have understood that language as suggesting that defendants had to prove that there was an absence of political discrimination before they could take advantage of the affirmative defense and show that they would have acted the same way for a different reason. 86 The possibility that the jurors might have misinterpreted the instructions in this way is bolstered by the fact that plaintiffs' counsel himself misunderstood the law in precisely that way and characterized it as such in his closing argument. Plaintiffs' counsel erroneously told the jury that it wouldn't even matter if, as [defendants] claimed, these plaintiffs had been fired ..., because the prior appointment had been wrong. Even if this was so, if you find that politics was a motivating factor, you must find for plaintiffs. 87 Had the court's instruction been accompanied by a separate Mt. Healthy question on the jury form, the potential confusion most likely would have been avoided. But the court rejected defendants' objection to the form, on the ground that the second question required that the jury find that the plaintiffs' political activity was a substantial or motivating factor. The court added that the jury would need to have rejected the Mt. Healthy defense in order to answer yes to that question. For the reasons explained earlier, an affirmative answer to that second question did not eliminate the need to go on to ask whether, even if defendants were politically motivated as to these actions, they would nevertheless have taken the same actions based on the illegality of the appointments. The court did, in fact, tell the jury in a short instruction during the charge that even if it answered the second question yes, it still needed to go on to the third question, which asked whether Defendants' acts were the proximate or legal cause of damages sustained by Plaintiff[s], and that it could answer that question yes or no. At least arguably, that third question embraced Mt. Healthy causation and implicated defendants' burden. But if the court did indeed understand the question in that way, then that interpretation simply cannot be reconciled with the court's comment to defense counsel about the meaning of the second question. And in any case, we cannot say with any assurance that the third question and the applicable instruction adequately corrected for the significant jury confusion that could have arisen from the misstatements and omissions described above. 88 Moreover, the wording of the second verdict form question was not precise, and that lack of precision might have affected the jurors' understanding of the interplay between verdict form questions two and three. The second question asked whether plaintiffs' political activity was a substantial or motivating factor in the defendants' decision to politically discriminate against the plaintiff[s] (emphasis added). It did not more precisely say in the defendants' decision to take adverse employment action against the plaintiff[s]. The wording of the question thus assumed a conclusion that was meant for the jury, and accordingly, could have contributed to juror confusion about whether defendants could meet their burden once there had been a finding of any political motivation. 89 If the evidence were very clearly in plaintiffs' favor that the Mt. Healthy defense failed, that might influence our assessment of the risk that the jury was misled. But our reading of the record is that defendants presented a very strong Mt. Healthy defense. Each of the defense witnesses reinforced the defense position that the personnel actions taken by the NPP regime during the review period were unlawful and that the Fuentes regime uniformly and fairly took corrective actions in accordance with the outside report from Applied Management. 90 Ana Bonet, who was primarily responsible for conducting the Applied Management audit, testified that she had extensive experience in Puerto Rico personnel services and explained that she had done similar audit work for about three other Puerto Rico agencies after the elections. She described in great detail the irregularities associated with the personnel actions taken as to each of the five plaintiffs during the review period, and she described in more general terms the irregularities associated with the personnel actions taken as to eighteen other employees during the review period. Bonet also testified about how her task was presented to her. She explained that she was told that [Fuentes and the executive committee] only wanted to verify whether [the twenty-three personnel actions during the review period] were correct. And if they were correct, everything was fine. And, if not, [Fuentes and the committee] would have to correct it. That description of the presentation supported the defense theory that the Fuentes regime applied the audit in a neutral way and would have taken corrective action regardless of political affiliation. 91 The jury also heard from Fuentes, the president of the Bank. She testified in detail about her decision to conduct the audit. Upon assuming the position, she explained, she learned that personnel salaries accounted for one of the Bank's highest expenses. As a result, she decided, in conjunction with the executive committee, that the Bank should verify whether its personnel actions were legitimate and hired Applied Management for that purpose. Legal counsel advised her and the committee that the best way to start the review process was to begin with the period of time closest to the electoral moratorium. Fuentes testified that she and the committee adhered strictly to the determinations in the outside report and did not involve themselves in the process of analyzing the legality of the personnel actions. They followed Bonet's recommendations, and as to the group of personnel actions involving irregularities in reinstatement, also consulted the Puerto Rico Department of Justice for an opinion. 92 Another defense witness, Aixa Diaz Montijo, who was the vice president of operations and supervised the Bank's division of human resources, testified that Applied Management was hired to conduct [the audit] process as objectively as possible. Her testimony also made it clear that every one of the personnel actions taken during the review period were analyzed as part of the audit. 93 To be sure, plaintiffs contested the illegality of the personnel actions taken during the review period and suggested that political discrimination was the motivating factor for the actions taken by the Fuentes regime. But the point here is simply that the affirmative defense was clearly viable given the testimony and thus that the existence of jury confusion as to the Mt. Healthy defense was not at all beside the point.