Opinion ID: 1899037
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The Petition for Review and the Figard Decision.

Text: Finally, Hutchinson contends that the full OEA erred in denying his petition for review. [8] He petitioned for reconsideration in light of Figard, a decision of another OEA administrative judge affecting another Department employee who had been fired after mishandling a 911 call; the case concerned the same Figard who had testified at Hutchinson's hearing and whose testimony Hutchinson's administrative judge did not credit, as discussed supra. Hutchinson asserts that the petition should have been granted for three primary reasons: (1) the petition satisfied the OEA's criteria for granting a petition for review, even though the OEA concluded otherwise, (2) issue preclusion would require the application of Figard to Hutchinson's case, and (3) the administrative judge's analysis in Figard demonstrates that Hutchinson was treated disparately from other, similarly-situated employees. We find no merit in any of these arguments.
The OEA denied Hutchinson's petition because it failed to satisfy the criteria of OEA Rule 637.4, 39 D.C.Reg. 7404, 7426 (1992), which lists the circumstances under which a petition may be granted. Specifically, the Figard decision was not new and material evidence ... that, despite due diligence, was not available when the record was closed. OEA R. 637.4(a), 39 D.C.Reg. at 7426. [9] The OEA emphasized that the Figard decision was available to Hutchinson because both employees were represented by the same attorney, who was served with the Figard decision when it was issued in July 1993. The record in Hutchinson's case closed several weeks later, in September 1993, and the initial decision was released on December 15 of that year. Hutchinson maintains that the administrative judge closed the record some time in March 1993, which would have been months before Figard was decided, but we see nothing in the record to indicate that the record formally closed until September 1, 1993. On January 15, 1993, the hearing examiner stated, I'll keep the record open pending receipt of your written closing statements. We read this as a statement that she intended to close the record some time after she received written closing arguments, which she indeed received that March, but a mere statement of intentions cannot be deemed a final order. Thus Hutchinson's attorney was aware of the Figard decision while the record remained open, but he failed to bring any value he felt it might have had to the attention of the administrative judge. Even if Hutchinson believed the record had closed, he could have moved to reopen the record under OEA Rule 634.1, 39 D.C.Reg. at 7425, as soon as he learned of the Figard decision. Instead, he waited until the administrative judge issued her initial decision and petitioned for review. The OEA properly denied Hutchinson's petition for review under OEA Rule 637.4(a).
Even if the petition for review had satisfied the OEA's rule, we see no basis to disagree with the OEA's conclusion that Hutchinson's Figard arguments lack merit in any event. Hutchinson argues that the doctrine of issue preclusion, or collateral estoppel, would require certain aspects of Figard to apply to his case. Issue preclusion applied to agency proceedings in certain circumstances, see Oubre v. District of Columbia Dep't of Employment Servs., 630 A.2d 699, 703 (D.C.1993), but the doctrine only precludes parties from relitigating an issue actually decided in a previous, final adjudication, see Rhema Christian Ctr. v. District of Columbia Bd. of Zoning Adjustment, 515 A.2d 189, 193 (D.C.1986) (emphasis added). Issue preclusion does not apply when the issues in the prior and current litigation are not identical, even though similar. 18 JAMES WM. MOORE, MOORE'S FEDERAL PRACTICE § 132.02[2][a] (3d ed.1997) (footnotes omitted). The issues underlying Hutchinson's termination may be somewhat similar, but they are not identical, to the issues underlying Figard's termination, and therefore the doctrine has no application to this case. The Figard decision concerned a 911 operator who was fired for inefficiency after someone called to report a man dangling from the high-voltage wires above an Amtrak facility but the operator did not promptly dispatch emergency crews. This was the operator's first disciplinary violation in all of his twenty-three years with the Fire Department. The OEA administrative judge in Figard found that removal was inappropriate on those facts. In particular, the administrative judge in Figard was concerned that the Fire Chief had announced his desire that all employees involved receive the `maximum penalty,' regardless of the rules and regulations governing personnel decisions. Hutchinson, however, does not purport to have been involved in the Figard incident, and none of the pertinent facts overlap. [10]
Hutchinson also contended before the OEA, as he does to us, that Figard indicates that removal constituted disparate treatment. Although he claims that removal was disparate treatment, Hutchinson has failed to identify any similarly-situated employees who have been treated differently. Hutchinson does not argue that he was treated disparately from Figard, the twenty-three year veteran, but rather that he was treated disparately from sixteen other employees whose cases were discussed by the administrative judge in the Figard decision. As the full OEA observed, however, Hutchinson was not situated similarly to these employees. Of the sixteen employees discussed in Figard, twelve had no prior disciplinary record whatever, quite unlike Hutchinson's record of three instances of discipline over just eighteen months. The four employees who had been disciplined before all worked on ambulance crews, not in the Communications Division, and so their job responsibilities and standards of professionalism were not strictly comparable with Hutchinson's. Thus Hutchinson has failed to demonstrate disparate treatment vis-a-vis the sixteen employees listed in the Figard decision. [11] Affirmed.