Opinion ID: 621702
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Exclusive Remedy Bar

Text: In inverse sequence, the appellants failed to raise the exclusivity argument at the close of evidence, instead reserving its initial articulation for their post-verdict motion.6 We have held in no uncertain terms that such failure to raise an issue prior to a Rule 50(b) motion for judgment as a matter of law, without more, results in a waiver of that issue on appeal. See, e.g., Casillas-Díaz v. Palau, 463 F.3d 77, 81 (1st Cir. 2006) (adopting plaintiffs' contention that defendants ha[d] waived their [argument] by not raising it until their post-trial motion for judgment as a matter of law); Larch v. Mansfield Mun. Elec. 6 The appellants raised the issue for the first time not in their actual Rule 50(b) motion, but rather in their response to the plaintiff's reply to the motion. -15- Dep't, 272 F.3d 63, 71-72 (1st Cir. 2001) (same); see also James W. Moore, 5A Moore's Federal Practice ¶ 50.08 (2d ed. 1994) ([A]ny argument omitted from the [Rule 50(a)] motion made at the close of evidence is waived as a ground for judgment under Rule 50(b).). Moreover, finding a waiver is particularly appropriate under the present circumstances, where the appellants not only failed to timely raise the argument, but also expressly stipulated in a joint proposed pretrial order that Article 1802 negligence was a contested issue of law to be addressed at trial, and filed proposed jury instructions on the Article 1802 claim. Even were we to deem the appellants' belated argument forfeited rather than waived, however, we would find no plain error here. See generally United States v. Turbides-Leonardo, 468 F.3d 34, 38 (1st Cir. 2006) (holding that forfeiture of an argument compels plain error review). We explain briefly. The crux of the appellants' exclusivity claim is that, pursuant to Puerto Rico case law, Article 1802 -- the Commonwealth's broad general tort statute -- may not be invoked concurrently with special labor laws, which they describe the ADEA and Act 115 as, unless the tortious or negligent conduct alleged under Article 1802 is sufficiently distinct from that covered by the paired employment statute. In support of this argument, the appellants rely principally upon a single unreported district court order, issued after the conclusion of the trial in this case and -16- mere weeks prior to the district court's denial of their Rule 50(b) motion. See Rosario v. Valdes, 2008 WL 509204 (D.P.R. Feb. 21, 2008) (unpublished order). In Rosario, the plaintiff brought an action under, inter alia, Act 80, P.R. Laws Ann. tit. 29, § 185 (wrongful dismissal act), Act 100, P.R. Laws Ann. tit 29, § 146 (employment discrimination act), and Article 1802, alleging sexual harassment by her employer. The court, itself relying on a few paragraphs from a 1994 Puerto Rico Supreme Court case, Santini Rivera v. Serv. Air., Inc., 137 D.P.R. 1 (P.R. 1994), opined that to the extent that a specific labor law covers the conduct for which a plaintiff seeks damages, he is barred from using that same conduct under Article 1802. An additional claim under Article 1802 may only be brought by the employee-plaintiff if it is based on tortious or negligent conduct distinct from that covered by the specific labor law(s) invoked. Rosario, 2008 WL 509204, at . We have held, on rare occasions, that a court's failure to recognize and apply, sua sponte, well-established case law can be so clear or obvious as to constitute plain error. See, e.g., Chestnut v. City of Lowell, 305 F.3d 18 (1st Cir. 2002) (en banc) (per curiam) (holding that a court's failure to recognize existing Supreme Court precedent and preclude, sua sponte, the availability of punitive damages for a 42 U.S.C. § 1983 claim, was sufficiently clear and obvious to amount to plain error); see also United States -17- v. Kasenge, 660 F.3d 537, 541 (1st Cir. 2011) (noting that one of the elements of plain error is that the error be clear or obvious). The district court's error here -- if error at all -- was neither clear nor obvious. While the contested punitive damages issue in Chestnut was known to the court, having been affirmatively raised by the court in the parties' presence but subsequently ignored, there is no suggestion that the trial court in this case should have known about the preemption argument proposed here. Further, in Chestnut, the issue had been decisively dispatched in a decades-old Supreme Court case; by contrast, the present topic of bar by exclusive remedy had been discussed only in an unpublished district court order issued after the trial had already concluded.7 Thus, although the District of Puerto Rico has since held that a single tort claim cannot serve as the basis for simultaneous damages under Act 115 and Article 1802, see, e.g., Nieves Perez v. Doctors' Center Bayamon, No. 09-2212, 2011 WL 1843057, at  (D.P.R. May 16, 2011), that case is not an appellate decision, and the issue was far from clear at the time of Serrano's trial, see, e.g., PaganAlejandro v. PR ACDelco Serv. Ctr., Inc., 468 F. Supp. 2d 316 (D.P.R. 2006) (considering an Article 1802 claim concurrently with 7 To the extent that the court might have considered the Rosario order in its analysis of the appellants' Rule 50(b) motion, it declined to consider the merits, correctly deeming the argument waived. See Larch, 272 F.3d at 71-72. -18- claims, based on the same conduct, under specific Puerto Rico employment statutes).8 The requirements for plain error are extremely demanding, and in this circuit, it is rare indeed . . . to find plain error in a civil [matter]. Chestnut, 305 F.3d at 20. This case is no exception. We conclude that, in light of the relative obscurity of Rosario, the paucity of jurisprudence on the issue at the time of trial, the fact that the issue was never raised by either party, and the appellants' own affirmative trial conduct acknowledging Article 1802 as a viable cause of action throughout the proceedings, the court's allowance of the Article 1802 claim did not constitute plain error. See United States v. Marino, 277 F.3d 11, 32 (1st Cir. 2002) (declining to find plain error where the law was unsettled).