Opinion ID: 4538314
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Commentary by Cunningham’s Lawyer

Text: Holsapple also argues that the district court incorrectly evaluated public written statements made by Amber Davis-Johnson, Bay County’s corporate counsel and Cunningham’s attorney, regarding Holsapple’s 2017 lawsuit. Specifically, in May 2018, a local, online newspaper, MLive, published an article about the litigation. In preparation for the article, the paper contacted Holsapple and Cunningham. Although both men declined to comment directly, each had a representative speak for him—Davis-Johnson on behalf of Cunningham, and Victor Mastromarco, the lawyer for Holsapple, on the latter’s behalf. Both sides’ comments appeared in the following section of the article: Holsapple declined to comment when contacted by The Bay City Times-MLive, referring the matter to [Victor] Mastromarco, his attorney. “This is a clear, plain case of retaliation by Cunningham,” Mastromarco said. . . . “People who have talked to (Holsapple) have said Cunningham has made statements that he’s not going to hire Holsapple,” Mastromarco continued. “It’s not (Cunningham’s) prerogative. His prerogative is being colored by Holsapple having filed a (prior) lawsuit against him.” Cunningham also declined to comment to MLive, referring matters to Amber DavisJohnson, the county’s corporation counsel. “The Bay County Sheriff strongly denies the allegations in Mr. Holsapple’s latest complaint,” Davis-Johnson said. “It is unfortunate that Mr. Holsapple continues to waste tax payer [sic] dollars on unsubstantiated lawsuits the sheriff’s office and Bay County are forced to defend. The sheriff remains confident that Mr. Holsapple’s complaint will be dismissed in its entirety and in short order. Despite Mr. Holsapple’s assertions, the sheriff is under no obligation to re-hire previously discharged employees whose past work ethic and performance with the department suggest he would not best serve the Bay County citizens the sheriff’s office is entrusted to protect.” (MLive Article, RE 17-8, Page ID # 661-668) Holsapple takes strong issue with Davis-Johnson’s statement, referencing it in connection with claims under both the First Amendment and state law (the latter of which is analyzed below). For the First Amendment claims in particular, Holsapple cites Davis-Johnson’s characterization of his lawsuits as a “waste of taxpayers’ dollars,” as well as Cunningham’s previous statements that 10 Case No. 19-1455, Holsapple v. Cunningham described Holsapple’s lawsuit as a “waste.” (Appellant Br. at 20).5 According to Holsapple, under the McDonnell Douglas burden-shifting framework, evidence of this nature can be “relevant to any showing of pretext” harbored by an employer-defendant in reaction to an employee’s “legitimate civil rights activities.” (Id. (citing McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 804 (1973)). Namely, in McDonnell Douglas, as Holsapple explains, the “Supreme Court found such evidence to be evidence of pretext, precisely because it was relevant to the employer’s motivation and helped to answer the question of whether the employer was motivated by its stated reason or an impermissible reason.” (Id.). Holsapple’s argument is misplaced on multiple levels. As an initial matter, and as the district court noted correctly, McDonnell Douglas concerns race discrimination—not First Amendment retaliation; therefore, Holsapple’s cherry-picking of that opinion’s statements—no matter how creative the effort—will not help him establish the causation element of a prima facie case for First Amendment retaliation. Instead of explaining the relevancy of McDonnell Douglas, as the district court judge requested he do, Holsapple makes only the conclusory statement in his appellate brief that “if an inference regarding an employer’s motivation can be drawn from certain evidence in one context, there is no rational basis to exclude the same inference in the other context.” This assertion alone is not enough to persuade. Nor does Holsapple’s citation of Whittie v. City of River Rouge, No. 14-11070, 2017 WL 4005943 at –3,  (E.D. Mich. Sept. 12, 2017), move the needle of his argument. Holsapple argues that in Whittie the employer’s “‘negative attitude’ towards [the] [p]laintiff’s reports of 5 Note that Holsapple does not appear to allege with any particularity when, in fact, Cunningham made this characterization of Holsapple’s activities. He only seems to offer that the comments were made during the 2016 election. However, if this was the case, then it even further dilutes the force of Holsapple’s argument, given that commentary of this nature is fairly inevitable during a political campaign between adversaries. 11 Case No. 19-1455, Holsapple v. Cunningham wrongdoing within the [police] department” was one of the facts that helped establish plaintiffemployee’s prima facie First Amendment retaliation case based on his termination from the department. However, for several reasons, Whittie is inapposite. First, in Whittie, the defendant-employer’s “negative” conduct towards the plaintiffemployee was far more persistent—occurring over the course of nearly a year—as compared to the one-time comments made by Cunningham and his attorney. Id. at –3. Second, the Whittie defendant addressed the negative statements directly to the employee right after the employee’s protected speech, thus establishing close temporal proximity between the protected activity and events leading up to the plaintiff’s termination—a nexus that our court assessed to be correlated with an employer’s “retaliatory motive.” Third, an unfavorable relationship existed between Cunningham and Holsapple for many years; whereas in Whittie, the plaintiff allegedly had a “harmonious” relationship with his employer, which only changed abruptly after the plaintiff’s protected speech (thus, suggesting the employer’s reasons for firing him were pretext). Id. at – 3, . Also, unlike the employer in Whittie, Cunningham and his attorney did not speak directly to the employee in conjunction with the challenged employment decision. Rather, Cunningham’s characterization of Holsapple’s activities as a “waste” was allegedly stated by him in passing during the 2016 election, while the comments made by Davis-Johnson were directed to a thirdparty Bay County Times journalist, who had specifically reached out for comment regarding the case. Finally, and most significantly, Whittie, along with the other case law Holsapple cites, deals with an employer’s retaliatory action against an active employee. Id. Here, by contrast, Cunningham decided not to hire Holsapple (i.e. an omission versus an affirmative act), who was a non-employee at the time, for the road patrol deputy position that likely attracted a number of qualified candidates. 12 Case No. 19-1455, Holsapple v. Cunningham Ultimately then, without more grounding in actual case law that either speaks to the issue of First Amendment retaliation in the employment context, or alternatively, speaks to the issue of employer retaliation in the case of an omission—not hiring a job applicant—Holsapple’s argument that this court should infer a “retaliatory motivation” from the statements made by Cunningham and his lawyer is misplaced. Therefore, these statements do not create a genuine dispute of material fact as to causation.