Opinion ID: 170686
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Legitimate Business Reason and Pretext

Text: Once the prima facie case is established, we look at the proffered nondiscriminatory reason for the termination. PacifiCorp asserts that the Trujillos intentionally falsified time records in order to earn compensation for time they had not worked. The Trujillos do not argue that PacifiCorp's proffered reason for their terminations is not a basis for firing them, only that it is a pretextual reason. To defeat PacifiCorp's claim on summary judgment, the plaintiff's burden is only to demonstrate a genuine dispute of material fact as to whether the proffered reasons were unworthy of belief. Morgan v. Hilti, Inc., 108 F.3d 1319, 1321 (10th Cir.1997). Pretext can be shown by such weaknesses, implausibilities, inconsistencies, incoherencies, or contradictions in the employer's proffered legitimate reasons for its action that a reasonable factfinder could rationally find them unworthy of credence and hence infer that the employer did not act for the asserted non-discriminatory reasons. Id. at 1323 (internal quotation marks omitted). As with the prima facie case, there is no one specific mode of evidence required to establish the discriminatory inference. See E.E.O.C. v. Horizon/CMS Healthcare Corp., 220 F.3d 1184, 1198-99 (10th Cir.2000). Rather, pretext can be shown in a variety of ways, including but not limited to differential treatment of similarly situated employees and procedural irregularities. The former is especially relevant where the defendant has proffered a legitimate non-discriminatory reason for the adverse employment action. Id. at 1195 n. 6. The Trujillos offered evidence regarding the differential treatment of similarly situated employees. [6] For example, approximately four weeks prior to Mr. Trujillo's termination, another long term employee, Linda Todd, was under investigation by the same management employees for two separate incidents in which she made threats of violence against other employees. During the course of the investigation, Ms. Todd maintained that stress caused her behavior. She was initially put on short term disability leave until her situation improved, although she was ultimately terminated for working while on that leave, drug and alcohol abuse and workplace violence. The treatment of Ms. Todd differs drastically from the treatment of both Trujillos. Rather than progressively discipline the Trujillos, taking into consideration their past performance and their current situation, PacifiCorp immediately terminated them. The Trujillos also presented evidence of a situation in which an employee was not terminated after committing serious misconduct by viewing pornography twice on company computers. Finally, severely undermining the company's claim that time theft resulted in immediate termination, the Trujillos offered evidence that many other employees were punished with days without pay, rather than termination, for time sheet violations. This disparate treatment of similarly situated employees contributes to a reasonable inference of pretext, defeating PacifiCorp's claimed legitimate business reason for terminating the Trujillos. We also note the inferences that can be drawn from the irregularity of PacifiCorp's actions in the course of the time theft investigation. Evidence presented to the district court indicates that comparing an employee's time sheets to his gate log records was an unreliable method of determining whether an employee purposefully attempted to be paid for hours not worked. The same is true when comparing records of employees who were assumed to come in and out of work together. Although PacifiCorp appears to have a policy in place for both recording time worked and entry and exit of the plant, there was evidence that the policy did not reflect what actually occurred in practice. PacifiCorp's sudden claim that a comparison of the Trujillos' time and gate records should exactly reflect the hours they self-recorded is suspicious given that managers, supervisors, and employees testified that neither time sheet nor gate access procedures were followed. We also consider the failure to interview Dan Michaelis in the course of the investigation a significant circumstance contributing to the inference of discrimination. Mr. Michaelis, one of the Trujillos' supervisors during the outage, was never asked about the alleged overage on their time cards although he had signed some of their time sheets during the relevant time period. In an affidavit, Mr. Michaelis averred that due to Charlie's illness, he had allowed both Trujillos to leave early without any adjustment to their time in order to attend to their son. Additionally, we note PacifiCorp's failure to apply its assumptions that the Trujillos came to work together to the benefit of the Trujillos. PacifiCorp only construed the evidence resulting from the comparison of their gate logs and time to sheets to the detriment of the Trujillos. For example, Mr. Trujillo's termination letter listed the fact that gate logs did not substantiate the hours he had listed on his May 18 and May 27 time sheets. While Mrs. Trujillo's gate logs showed attendance for the proper number of hours on those days, the company nevertheless ignored an assumption that Mr. Trujillo was there when his wife was, and used those dates as a basis for termination. Likewise, while records show that on May 10, 2003, Mr. Trujillo entered the plant earlier than the scheduled shift, Mrs. Trujillo was terminated, in part, for not having a gate entry prior to the entry of the start of the same shift. The failure to progressively discipline the Trujillos as PacifiCorp did other similarly situated employees, in addition to its failure to conduct what appeared to be a fair investigation of the Trujillos' alleged time theft, create genuine issues of material fact on whether PacifiCorp's reason for terminating them was pretextual. [I]t is permissible for the trier of fact to infer the ultimate fact of discrimination from the falsity of the employer's explanation. Reeves, 530 U.S. at 147, 120 S.Ct. 2097. PacifiCorp criticizes the Trujillos' case as one requiring us to build inference upon inference to establish the requisite discriminatory motive. To support its argument, PacifiCorp cites Ennis v. National Association of Business and Educational Radio, Inc., 53 F.3d 55 (4th Cir.1995), an association discrimination case in which the plaintiff alleged she was terminated because she had a child who was HIV-positive. Id. at 62. To establish an inference of discrimination, the plaintiff presented evidence of a memorandum to employees suggesting that expensive claims would increase employee premiums. Id. at 57. The document was issued seven months prior to her termination. From these circumstances, the plaintiff wanted an inference that her employer terminated her because of her child's chronic disease. Given her relatively short tenure and a record replete with evidence that her employer had been unhappy with her performance, there was no reasonable inference of a nexus between cost of the child's health problems and plaintiff's termination. Id. at 62 (The building of one inference upon another will not create a genuine issue of material fact. Mere unsupported speculation, such as this, is not enough to defeat a summary judgment motion.) (internal citations omitted). This case shapes up quite differently. In this record, there was considerable evidence of concern about healthcare costs and facts that demonstrated that the company was aware high dollar claims like Charlie's could only increase those costs. Upon news of Charlie's relapse, the company used unusual auditing procedures to demonstrate that their long term employees, the Trujillos, defrauded them of a total of exactly 40 hours. Although the company had progressively disciplined similarly situated employees for the same or equally serious offenses, it immediately terminated the Trujillos. Although the couple together served PacifiCorp for 28 years, they were never given the benefit of the doubt during the investigation. Rather, the company seemingly relied only on evidence to the detriment of the Trujillos and failed to interview key witnesses. When viewed in the light most favorable to the Trujillos, the evidence provides a reasonable inference that the Trujillos were costing the company time and money and considered it better to terminate them than to incur the costs of Charlie's illness.