Opinion ID: 164784
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Propriety of the Administrator's Ruling

Text: 38 We now turn to the particulars of the appeal before us. Zoltanski contends that various of the Administrator's findings of fact are not supported by substantial evidence and that the Administrator erred in concluding that Zoltanski violated 14 C.F.R. § 107.20. There is no dispute, however, regarding most of the historical facts relating to the airport incident. And the propriety of the Administrator's ruling turns only on whether she could find that it was unreasonable for Zoltanski to believe that she had completed security screening. Our discussion can therefore be relatively brief. 39 The controversy centers on Zoltanski's responses to Avila and Badu. The Administrator found that (1) Avila told Zoltanski to wait at the checkpoint while he got his supervisor, and (2) Badu, wearing a security officer's coat and an identification badge, told Zoltanski as she stood on the train platform that she needed to have her purse screened. Each of these findings was supported by substantial evidence and we see no reason to refuse to defer to either finding. We discuss each in turn. 40 As for the first finding, Avila testified, I told her to wait, and she just said she wanted to talk to my supervisor. R., Vol. I, Doc. 15, at 90. Later he explained, I was like not even like a foot away from her, and I told her to wait while I go get my other supervisor. R., Vol. II, Doc. 29, at 283. Such testimony based on personal knowledge constitutes quintessential substantial evidence. Moreover, the ALJ credited this testimony, finding that Zoltanski asked to speak to Avila's supervisor. ... Avila told her to wait. R., Vol. II, Doc. 35, at 3 (internal citations omitted). 41 The only possible basis for challenging the Administrator's finding is that the ALJ apparently also made a finding contrary to Avila's testimony. The ALJ's decision seems to say that Avila did not tell Zoltanski to wait. See id. (Denying that Avila had told her to wait, [Zoltanski] asserted that no one had told her that she could not continue to the trains.) Perhaps the ALJ's two findings could be reconciled by saying that Avila told Zoltanski to wait but she did not hear him. It is unclear, however, how that could be the case. Avila testified that he was only a foot away from Zoltanski when he spoke to her, and the ALJ found that checkpoint traffic was light at the time. If Avila told her to wait, she must have heard him or intentionally avoided hearing him. 42 Had the ALJ not believed Avila, the matter would be rather different. But the ALJ made no adverse credibility findings, even saying that each witness believed in the truth of what he or she stated. Id. When the ALJ makes such hard-to-reconcile findings without making any effort to explain how they can be reconciled, the Administrator need not defer to one finding over the other but can draw her own reasonable inferences from the record. We therefore affirm the Administrator's finding that Avila told Zoltanski to wait. 43 The Administrator's other critical finding — that Badu, clearly identified as a security officer, told Zoltanski that she needed to have her purse screened — is also supported by first-hand testimony and is undercut only by an ALJ finding that contradicts another one of his findings supporting the Administrator's finding. According to Badu's testimony, when he came out of his office and saw Zoltanski descending down the escalator to the train station, he: 44 followed her, and ... asked her to come back so that we could finish screening her bag. She kept on descending. As she went down to the train station, I went down there and told her, Ma'am, please, we need to screen your bag. This is an FAA requirement. You can't board the train. 45 R., Vol. I, Doc. 15, at 99. 46 Zoltanski contends that Badu was not identifiable as a security officer. She argues that the Administrator improperly rejected the ALJ's findings that Badu's jacket was a different color from that of other airport security personnel and that he was not wearing a badge. To be sure, the ALJ made these findings, but he also found that Badu was wearing a badge and the same maroon blazer as Avila. It would have been impossible for the Administrator to defer to both of the contradictory findings by the ALJ. The Administrator's finding was supported by the record and must be affirmed. 47 We further hold that the Administrator's findings of historical fact support her determination that Zoltanski could not have reasonably believed that she had completed the screening process. After all, (1) Zoltanski was asked to submit her purse for ETD screening; (2) she was told that ETD screening was FAA policy; (3) she objected to ETD screening and asked to speak to a supervisor; (4) she departed the screening area without waiting (even briefly) for the supervisor and even though Avila told her to wait; and (5) when Badu, who was wearing an identification badge and the same maroon jacket as Avila, caught up to her on the train platform and said her purse needed to be screened, she responded that she had been through screening. Disagreeing with the ALJ as to the import of no one specifically communicat[ing] to Zoltanski that she could not proceed to the gates, the Administrator observed, Given that Zoltanski had been told to wait, ... what is more important is that no one told her that she could proceed. R., Vol. II, Doc. 42, at 10. The Administrator also reasoned that in light of Zoltanski's interactions with checkpoint personnel, it was not reasonable for Zoltanski to conclude that the man who approached her on the train platform (Shift Supervisor Badu) was not associated with security. As a result, she should have stopped and waited until the matter was resolved. Id. at 11. The Administrator concluded that Zoltanski should have known that security personnel were not satisfied that she had completed screening. Id. at 8. This is a reasonable view of the evidence. 48 Zoltanski complains that the Administrator should have deferred to the ALJ's view regarding what it was reasonable for Zoltanski to think. We disagree. As we have written in a similar context, [I]n cases in which the ALJ and the Board reach contrary conclusions, we determine whether the Board sufficiently articulated reasons for rejecting the ALJ's findings or conclusions. Grubb v. FDIC, 34 F.3d 956, 961 (10th Cir.1994). If the Board ... has merely drawn inferences from the established facts contrary to those of the ALJ, ... the Board's rejection of the ALJ's conclusions is less significant. Nephi Rubber Prods., 976 F.2d at 1364. The Administrator need not defer to the ALJ in deciding whether a person's conduct was objectively reasonable in light of specified facts. The ALJ's observation of the witnesses during their testimony offers no advantage in resolving the issue because it does not turn on credibility or any other feature of the particular people involved in the incident — the task is to decide what a reasonable person would think or do. 49 The record and common sense support the Administrator's finding. Accordingly, we uphold the Administrator's ruling that Zoltanski violated the regulation.