Opinion ID: 1435201
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Evidentiary Proffer.

Text: At the summary judgment hearing, the district court ruled inadmissible statements contained in the internal age discrimination grievances filed by members of the IP group. These unsworn grievances referenced age-discriminatory remarks allegedly made by Feagans to Porter and another co-worker (who recounted them to Porter). The district court ruled that the unsworn grievances constituted inadmissible hearsay. Bennett, 453 F.Supp.2d at 324-25 (citing Cloutier v. Costco Wholesale Corp., 390 F.3d 126, 137 (1st Cir.2004)). The plaintiff argues that the court improperly excluded this evidence both because the defendants admitted that the grievances had been filed and because the crucial statements fall within any of several possible exceptions to or exclusions from the hearsay rule. In that regard, he mentions the exclusion for prior inconsistent statements, Fed.R.Evid. 801(d)(1); the exclusion for admissions by a party-opponent, id. 801(d)(2)(A); the exclusion for admissions by an employer's agent acting within the scope of employment, id. 801(d)(2)(D); and the exception for statements concerning state of mind, id. 803(3). He also mentions the exceptions for business records, id. 803(6), and for operative facts, id. 807. He also makes a curious argument that Feagans's alleged comment is not offered for the truth of the matter asserted (in which event it would fall outside the hearsay definition altogether, see id. 801(c)). We review claims relating to the admission or exclusion of evidence for abuse of discretion. See United States v. Brown, 500 F.3d 48, 58 (1st Cir.2007); Torres-Arroyo v. Rullán, 436 F.3d 1, 7 (1st Cir.2006). That same abuse-of-discretion standard applies to a district court's decision to admit or exclude evidence at the summary judgment stage. See Gen. Elec. Co. v. Joiner, 522 U.S. 136, 143, 118 S.Ct. 512, 139 L.Ed.2d 508 (1997); Orta-Castro v. Merck, Sharp & Dohme Química P.R., Inc., 447 F.3d 105, 110 (1st Cir.2006). The plaintiff's initial argument assumes too much. Although the defendants admitted that the grievances were in fact filed, that admission does not equate to an admission that Feagans made the statements attributed to him in the grievances. As the plaintiff acknowledges, see Appellant's Br. at 27, the defendants consistently have denied that any such comments were made. Our decision in Dávila v. Corporación De Puerto Rico Para La Difusión Pública, 498 F.3d 9 (1st Cir.2007), largely disposes of the plaintiff's next argument. There, the plaintiff relied on an affidavit stating that others had told him that his supervisor considered him too old for his job. Id. at 17. But the plaintiff did not offer an affidavit from any person who actually had heard the alleged statement. Given this omission, we ruled that the statement was hearsay under Federal Rule of Evidence 801(c) and reiterated that [i]t is black-letter law that hearsay evidence cannot be considered on summary judgment. Dávila, 498 F.3d at 17. The scenario here demands the same result. The plaintiff had no first-hand knowledge of Feagans's alleged remarks, nor did he tender an affidavit from Porter or any other percipient witness attesting to them. Thus, the comments attributed to Feagans in Porter's grievance were hearsay. The plaintiff's sundry attempts to avoid the hearsay bar do not call for a different result. Indeed, because Porter's grievance was unsworn, her narrative about Feagans's comments comprised hearsay within hearsay and, thus, confronted a doubled hearsay bar. See Fed.R.Evid. 805; see, e.g., United States v. Patrick, 248 F.3d 11, 22 (1st Cir.2001). The plaintiff's efforts either to characterize these comments as nonhearsay or to fit them into a hearsay exception are unavailing. While the plaintiff lists a litany of hearsay exceptions and exclusions, most of these references are unaccompanied by developed argumentation and, accordingly, need not be addressed. See United States v. Zannino, 895 F.2d 1, 17 (1st Cir.1990). The remainder are easily dispatched. See, e.g., United States v. Millán, 230 F.3d 431, 438 (1st Cir.2000) (holding statement inadmissible under state-of-mind exception to hearsay rule absent proof of personal knowledge); Ricciardi v. Children's Hosp. Med. Ctr., 811 F.2d 18, 22 (1st Cir.1987) (requiring a showing of personal knowledge before evidence may be admitted under the business records exception to the hearsay rule). And, finally, the plaintiff never explains how the admission of the grievances other than for the truth of the matter asserted would advance his cause. We add, moreover, that even if the grievances did not comprise hearsay, they would not have had a decisive bearing on the issues before the district court. After all, Feagans was not the decisionmaker here. Thus, whether or not he made discriminatory comments would not have affected the outcome (which turned on whether Mesher  the person responsible for the decision to terminate the plaintiff's employment  acted out of a discriminatory animus). Put another way, since Feagans had no part in the adverse employment decision, his comments, even if made, would constitute nothing more than stray remarks. As such, they would be insufficient to block summary judgment. See, e.g., Ramírez Rodríguez v. Boehringer Ingelheim Pharms., Inc., 425 F.3d 67, 84 (1st Cir.2005) (holding stray remarks by nondecisionmakers insufficient to prove pretext); Rivera-Aponte v. Rest. Metropol # 3, Inc., 338 F.3d 9, 12 (1st Cir.2003) (similar); González v. El Día, Inc., 304 F.3d 63, 69 (1st Cir.2002) (similar).