Opinion ID: 197192
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Plaintiff's Appeal: The Merits

Text: 2 At this juncture, there are directed verdicts on seven counts which are contested by plaintiff 1 , as well as several evidentiary rulings. The litigation resulted in over 100 docket entries from complaint to filing the notice of appeal and five days of jury trial, at the end of which the court granted defendants' motions for directed verdict. We have meticulously reviewed both the transcript and the exhibits. The smoke now dissipated, we are compelled to conclude that there is no longer any discernible fire. 3 In view of the fact that such ample opportunity was afforded below to pursue all avenues in support of the claims, we do not feel it incumbent on us to replay all of the evidence. We shall content ourselves with a capsule summary of events and a brief consideration of the viability of each claim as of the end of the evidence. 4 Factual Background. Plaintiff, a black person, 2 had been a public school teacher for ten years when, in 1989, he drew an assignment as an art teacher to the Solomon Lewenberg Middle School in Mattapan, of which O'Neill was the principal. There was an obvious miscommunication, for when plaintiff appeared, O'Neill felt that there was no vacancy because another teacher, Molloy, a white person, had already filled it. He sent plaintiff back twice, but plaintiff finally was placed in the school, in addition to Molloy, and given an adequate room, only to be reassigned to a less satisfactory room shortly after. 3 He also had trouble obtaining adequate art supplies. Soon after arrival at the school, plaintiff was asked to attend an orientation meeting; when he arrived, O'Neill accused him of breaking a lock at the art room. In fact, plaintiff said, there was a door hinge without any lock on it. Apparently there were no consequences to this incident. 5 Later in September and in October, O'Neill visited two of plaintiff's art classes for 45 and 55 minutes and prepared evaluations of his teaching. Plaintiff was criticized for his lesson planning, classroom management, and maintaining a learning environment, but was given satisfactory ratings for other factors such as use of materials, treatment of students, and professional cooperation Plaintiff responded vigorously to both evaluations. 6 O'Neill was on leave during the 1990-1991 school year during which time Anderson had one satisfactory evaluation by another superior. In September of 1991, when O'Neill had returned, he summoned plaintiff to a formal hearing concerning an incident when Anderson appeared at school, allegedly with alcohol on his breath, detected by the assistant principal, Philogene, a black person, by another superior, Giacalone, and by others. For this he was given a warning. Later, in December of 1991 and January of 1992, O'Neill issued two more evaluations, giving many unsatisfactory ratings and noting that students in plaintiff's class were using foul language, playing cards, and reading comics. 7 Finally, on January 24, 1992, O'Neill was visited in his office by three black girl students who wanted to talk to him about Anderson's behavior. Two of them complained that plaintiff had made sexual advances to them by touching them and by making inappropriate remarks. The third stated that she had observed such conduct. They also said that he had made unwanted telephone calls to them at home. O'Neill then consulted with the office of the East Zone Superintendent of the Boston Public Schools, Clifford B. Janey, the city's General Counsel, and the Department of Safety. Janey, a black person, in turn instructed O'Neill to conduct a full investigation. This was undertaken, although there is no evidence detailing how it began, how the police were involved, or what steps were taken. In early February, plaintiff was relieved of his duties and transferred pending hearing and resolution. A criminal complaint was later filed after a show cause hearing. A bench trial in the spring of 1993 resulted in a judgment of guilty, but later a jury trial in December resulted in a not guilty verdict. 8 This suit was filed shortly thereafter. Analysis: 9 Racial discrimination. We first consider the claims of racial discrimination, which are embraced by Counts I (42 U.S.C. § 1983), II (42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq.), and IV (Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 151B). The striking fact about this case is that after all of the discovery and five days of trial, no evidence of either pretext or racially motivated discrimination was presented for jury consideration. No conversations evidencing racial animus were presented, nor any instances of unexplained more favorable treatment of similarly situated whites. There was no evidence that the accusations of lock breaking or of appearing at school under the influence of alcohol were racially motivated or even initiated by Principal O'Neill. As for the evaluations, they could possibly be viewed by a jury as stemming from too rigorous a sense of management, order, and discipline, but there is no racial innuendo in O'Neill's extensive notations, discussions, and suggestions for improvement. 10 Indeed, plaintiff acknowledges all this in his motion for a new trial, where, in arguing that the court erred in excluding evidence of the subsequent in-house handling of sexual harassment claims against two white school employees, he argued: The admission of this evidence would have provided the 'race' that the Court was looking for at Directed Verdict. Unless the exclusion of this evidence was reversible error, the charges of racial discrimination must be held not to be supported by evidence sufficient to reach a jury. 11 The evidence proffered was that, six months after the complaints against plaintiff, two white Lewenberg School employees were accused of inappropriate sexual conduct involving female students. (A custodian was accused of kissing a student, and a shop teacher was accused of telling a student, found hiding under a stairway, that she would have to kiss the teacher before she would be let out.) In both instances, the complaints were handled without involving the police, through meetings with the students, the employees, a parent, and a guardian. Plaintiff argues that O'Neill's failure to call in the police and to require signed statements, and his personal meeting with the students and parents contrasts sharply with what took place after the complaints were lodged against plaintiff. 12 Plaintiff faces the considerable hurdle of establishing an abuse of discretion by the district court in excluding the evidence. That court's basic determination was that plaintiff had not carried his burden of showing that the white employee cases were similarly situated to that of plaintiff, in order to lay a basis for the admission of the evidence. In the first place there is no evidence that there was any precise policy that mandated a specific course of action that in practice was applied differently to whites and blacks. Certainly the manner in which O'Neill sought and followed guidance in following up on the complaints against plaintiff does not suggest any predisposition to treat plaintiff any differently from anyone else found in his predicament. 13 But, most pertinently, a simultaneous complaint by three female students involving touching, suggestive remarks, and observation of other such conduct, together with unwanted telephone calls at home, would seem to involve a demonstrably different order of magnitude than the solitary charges against the two white employees. See Perkins v. Brigham & Women's Hosp., 78 F.3d 747, 751 (1st Cir.1996). Moreover, there is no indication that any changes in approach had been invoked subsequent to the January complaints. We conclude that the district court did not exceed its discretion in excluding the evidence. 14 Libel and Slander. Plaintiff relies heavily on the four performance evaluations made by O'Neill to make out a jury case of defamation. But these, as well as statements concerning plaintiff's breaking a lock and his erratic behavior, are subject to the qualified privilege of an employer or supervisor to monitor, discuss, and attempt to improve subordinates' performance. Much of what plaintiff complains about was not contested. Much was obviously the Principal's opinion as to what was good or bad educational practice. But none of it could have been found to have been knowingly false or in reckless disregard of the truth. Judd v. McCormack, 27 Mass.App.Ct. 167, 535 N.E.2d 1284, 1289 (1989) (reversing for failure to direct a verdict even though tasteless and harsh language was used); Bratt v. International Business Machines Corp., 392 Mass. 508, 467 N.E.2d 126, 131-32 (1984). 15 Massachusetts Civil Rights Act. Under Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 12, § 11H, 11I, interference with rights of another by threats, intimidation or coercion gives rise to a cause of action. These predicate words have been sternly construed by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. Threat involves an intentional exertion of pressure to make another fearful ... of injury or harm. Intimidation involves putting in fear for the purpose of compelling or deterring conduct. And coercion involves the application to another of such force, either physical or moral, as to constrain him to do against his will something he would not otherwise have done. Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts v. Blake, 417 Mass. 467, 631 N.E.2d 985, 990 (1994). 16 Nothing in the evidence remotely suggests pressures of these magnitudes being brought to bear on plaintiff. Even his own selfserving testimony on cross examination that one of the complainants against him, April Allen, told him that O'Neill in talking with her twice said that he had seen plaintiff touching her, contrary to her own supposed belief, falls far short of indicating any such pressure on her which could forcefully impact on him. 17 Malicious Prosecution. Plaintiff contends that he has fulfilled the two threshold requirements of malicious prosecution: initiation of criminal proceedings with malice and without probable cause, and termination of such proceedings in his favor. He fails on both counts. First, there is no evidence of precisely how the criminal proceedings were initiated. As the Massachusetts Appeals Court noted in Ziemba v. Fo'cs'le, Inc., 19 Mass.App.Ct. 484, 475 N.E.2d 1223, 1226 (1985), even the act of calling the police is not the equivalent of instituting criminal proceedings. It may well be that such a decision was made by the police themselves. 18 Equally important, the fact that the bench trial, unimpeached by any evidence of perjury by defendant O'Neill (who did not testify at either the show cause hearing or the bench trial), or of subornation of perjury, resulted in a judgment of guilty is a complete bar to the action. Della Jacova v. Widett, 355 Mass. 266, 244 N.E.2d 580, 582 (1969). It should not be necessary to add that plaintiff's testimony of an alleged statement by his accuser April Allen concerning O'Neill's supposed statements that he had seen plaintiff lay hands on her, may not be dignified as evidence of subornation of perjury. 19 Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress. Again, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has sharply circumscribed the reach of this tort. In Sena v. Commonwealth, 417 Mass. 250, 629 N.E.2d 986, 994 (1994) the court stated that to sustain a claim of intentional infliction of emotional distress, a plaintiff must show 1) that the defendant intended to cause, or should have known that his conduct would cause, emotional distress; 2) that the defendant's conduct was extreme and outrageous; 3) that the defendant's conduct caused the plaintiff's distress; and 4) that the plaintiff suffered severe distress. Id. (citing Agis v. Howard Johnson Co., 371 Mass. 140, 355 N.E.2d 315, 318 (1976). The Agis court cited approvingly such language as beyond all possible bounds of decency and utterly intolerable in a civilized community. 355 N.E.2d at 319. However one may view any of the actions attributable to Principal O'Neill, one could not fairly apply any of these rubrics to them. 20 Evidentiary Issues. Of the three evidentiary issues argued by plaintiff, we have already disposed of one, the court's exclusion of the evidence concerning the handling of the sex harassment complaints against the two white employees. A second involves the granting of defendant's motion in limine to exclude April Allen's statements about O'Neill's conversation with her. But, as our above discussion reveals, the same testimony came in on the cross examination of plaintiff. We see no need to revisit in any detail what was already exposed. 21 The last claim is simply that the court excluded evidence that early in 1992 O'Neill called into his office the proffered witness, a former male student, and another who was accused of improper conduct and made them sign statements he had prepared. Plaintiff sees this incident as evidence of O'Neill's modus operandi. But O'Neill is not alleged to have engaged in any such conduct in this case; his supposed statements to April Allen of what he said he saw are of an obviously different modus than calling a student into his office and forcing the signing of a previously prepared written statement. The evidence would have little relevance, if any, but would have been freighted with prejudice. The court did not abuse its discretion.