Opinion ID: 2653585
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Effect of the 2009 Settlement

Text: The Corps argues that Rodríguez-Vives is really complaining that the Corps has, in effect, failed to perform its obligations under the settlement agreement. Pointing to the district court's retention of jurisdiction to enforce the settlement, Amended Judgement of February 24, 2009, Rodríguez-Vives v. Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Case No. 3:05-cv-02136-DRD, Dkt. No. 74, the Corps maintains that Rodríguez-Vives's only remedy was to file a motion to enforce the settlement in that previously closed action. Failing to do so, the Corps argues, somehow gives rise to a res judicata bar to this action. -6- As the district court correctly recognized, the 2009 settlement agreement bars Rodríguez-Vives from bringing now a related claim that could have been brought prior to the date of the settlement, or arising out of events occurring prior to that date. Rodríguez-Vives, though, rests this action on the Corps's conduct after the date of the settlement. Thus the settlement agreement provides no bar to this retaliation claim, nor could it. See Graham Cnty. Soil & Water Conservation Dist. v. U.S. ex rel. Wilson, 545 U.S. 409, 419 (2005) (noting in the statute of limitations context that a cause of action for retaliation generally accrues when the retaliatory action occurs); Alexander v. Gardner-Denver Co., 415 U.S. 36, 51-52 (1974) (holding in the arbitration context that an employee may retrospectively waive Title VII claims as part of a settlement but that an employee's rights under Title VII may not be waived prospectively); 14 Penn Plaza LLC v. Pyett, 556 U.S. 247, 265 (2009) (noting that GardnerDenver was correct in concluding that federal antidiscrimination rights may not be prospectively waived but holding that agreement to arbitrate a Title VII claim was not a waiver). Nor can we see any reason why Rodríguez-Vives, in seeking a remedy for the alleged post-settlement acts, was limited to enforcement of the settlement agreement. Suppose the Corps had intentionally run over Rodríguez-Vives with a truck to prevent her from being able to perform her new position. No reasonable person -7- would argue that her remedies would be limited to filing a motion to enforce the settlement agreement. Like an action for assault and battery, a retaliation claim is a separate and independent cause of action that stands or falls on its own. Jones v. Walgreen Co., 679 F.3d 9, 20 (1st Cir. 2012) (internal quotation marks omitted). Moreover, interpreting the settlement agreement as limiting Rodríguez-Vives's rights to bringing an enforcement action rather than asserting her statutory right to protection from postsettlement retaliation would constitute a form of pre-retaliation waiver, which is prohibited under Title VII. See Gardner-Denver, 415 U.S. at 51-52; 14 Penn Plaza LLC, 556 U.S. at 265. This is not to say that the settlement agreement is irrelevant to this suit. If facts not apparent on the face of the settlement agreement show that the settlement agreement is properly interpreted to place on Rodríguez-Vives's post-settlement duties as a transitory firefighter the restrictions about which she complains in her complaint, such a showing would likely be material to determining whether the restrictions were retaliatory. The possibility of such a defense, though, is inadequate to allow a defendant to prevail on a motion to dismiss when the plaintiff alleges a materially different version of the facts. Nor does the interpretation and implementation of the settlement agreement have any role in parrying the other allegations of retaliatory harassment made by Rodríguez-Vives, such as her claims that the -8- sergeant threw the station's journal at her and that he verbally harassed her. For all these reasons, we can find no basis in the settlement agreement for insulating the Corps from the possibility of Title VII liability for the alleged acts of unlawful retaliation committed after the agreement was signed on February 5, 2009.