Opinion ID: 2818185
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Estes's conduct

Text: Wyndham also does not contest that Estes's conduct toward Planadeball in June and July 2012, including taking away her opportunity to work with existing timeshare owners, may constitute a material adverse action. However, it similarly argues that there is no evidence of a causal link between Estes's behavior and protected conduct.5 Planadeball contends that the temporal 4 Although Planadeball has presented evidence of other instances of protected conduct, her complaints to Maley and Wieczerzak are the only conduct that occurred before the chargeback was issued, and, therefore, are the only conduct that Planadeball contends establishes a causal nexus with this material adverse action. 5 Wyndham also contends that we should not consider Estes's conduct while evaluating Planadeball's retaliation claim because Planadeball failed to amend her complaint to incorporate Estes's actions that took place after Planadeball had filed her complaint. Wyndham relies on Quevedo-Gaitan v. Sears Roebuck de P.R., Inc., a district court case in which the court disregarded evidence of age discrimination that occurred after the plaintiff had filed her complaint because she had failed to amend it. See 536 F. Supp. 2d -15- proximity between Estes's conduct and the filing of her complaint on June 19, 2012, establishes the requisite nexus. Planadeball's claim fails for the same reason the chargeback claim fails. There is no evidence that Estes was aware that Planadeball had filed a complaint. Estes stated that she had no knowledge as to the claims and allegations that Carmen Planadeball ha[d] brought against [Wyndham] in any forum. Moreover, Planadeball admitted that she does not know what information, if any, Estes had with respect to her litigation. On this record, there is simply no evidence from which a reasonable jury could infer that Estes had knowledge of Planadeball's protected activity. Therefore, Planadeball cannot establish the third element of a prima facie case of retaliation, a causal nexus between filing her complaint and Estes's actions. See Alvarado v. Donahoe, 687 F.3d 453, 459 (1st Cir. 2012) ([I]f a supervisor or other employee is unaware of the fact that a plaintiff engaged in 158, 170 (D.P.R. 2008). Planadeball counters that she was not required to amend her complaint at the summary judgment stage because she was not asserting a new claim or adding a new defendant, but merely was providing additional facts to support her retaliation claim, which was already plausibly alleged in the complaint. See Rodríguez-Vives v. P.R. Firefighters Corps of P.R., 743 F.3d 278, 283 (1st Cir. 2014) (A complaint need not allege every fact necessary to win at trial, but need only include sufficient facts to make it plausible on its face.); see also id. at 286 (noting that a complaint is not required to provide the exact details of each incident, such as the dates or the precise context of the abusive comments, to make [a retaliation] claim plausible). We do not need to resolve this dispute. Even assuming that we can consider Estes's conduct, Planadeball's claim still fails. -16- protected conduct, any actions attributable to him could not plausibly have been induced by retaliatory motives.).