Opinion ID: 51501
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Martinez's Remarks

Text: Berquist asserts that Martinez's comments regarding the desire to attract younger talent, and her reference to Plaisance and Zatopek as the younger credit review officers, support his claim of age discrimination. Statements evince unlawful discrimination only if the comments first, demonstrate discriminatory animus and, second, [are] made by a person primarily responsible for the adverse employment action or by a person with influence or leverage over the formal decisionmaker. Laxton v. Gap Inc., 333 F.3d 572, 583 (5th Cir.2003) (citing Russell v. McKinney Hosp. Venture, 235 F.3d 219, 225 (5th Cir. 2000)). Under this test, Martinez's comments do not constitute evidence of age discrimination. Martinez made the first comment regarding younger talent in December 2002, six months before Washington Mutual terminated Berquist, and the comment does not at all relate to this employment decision. According to Berquist's contemporaneous transcription of the comment, Martinez stated that Performance issues will be promptly and aggressively dealt with. We will build leaders internally and attract younger talent. Washington Mutual contends that regardless of whether Martinez expressed an intention to attract younger talent, this remark was too vague and remote in time to show any discriminatory animus on the part of Washington Mutual in terminating Berquist. Martinez made no mention of replacing older employees with younger recruits or directly hiring younger employees into leadership positions. Unlike other cases in which we have considered remarks as evidence of discriminatory intent, this comment was a broad statement not directed to any particular employee about her management goals and remote in time from Berquist's firing. See Machinchick v. PB Power, Inc., 398 F.3d at 345, 353 (5th Cir.2005) (supervisor sent e-mail, just weeks before terminating plaintiff, discussing plans to strategically hire some younger engineers and designers; supervisor said plaintiff was inflexible and not adaptable); Rachid, 376 F.3d at 313, 315 (holding that employer's ageist comments to and about employee constituted evidence of age discrimination); Bienkowski, 851 F.2d at 1507 n. 4 (holding that comments requiring the employee to look sharp and criticizing an inability to adapt to new procedures constituted evidence of age discrimination); Palasota, 342 F.3d at 576 (supervisor sent a memorandum, two months before plaintiff's termination, recommending severance packages for fourteen named employees, all of whom were specifically identified as over fifty years of age, to create the flexibility to bring on some new players). Accordingly, in this context, we conclude that this statement is not evidence of age discrimination. As to Martinez's reference to Plaisance and Zatopek as younger employees, Washington Mutual asserts, and Berquist offers no alternative interpretation, that Martinez made this comment to contrast Plaisance and Zatopek with Berquist, the senior employee in the department. In his role as the senior employee, Martinez expected Berquist to provide leadership for the inexperienced members of the group. Berquist provides a similarly harmless interpretation of this statement in his response to the PIN, which was written prior to this litigation. Berquist's writes that The criticism mentioned repeatedly on March 4 from Ms. Martinez and Ms. Hart was that I did not notify them of the lack of desk reviews being sent to Houston to be performed by the young guys in the Houston office. I responded that since I reported directly to Ron Yancis at the time, it was not in my work experience to go over my boss's head directly to Credit Review management. . . . Ms. Martinez told me that I was a senior officer in this office and that other two employees in the department besides former Regional Manager Ron Yancis and myself were inexperienced young men who needed leadership. Based on Berquist's personal impressions of the statement, we decline to characterize this comment as anything more than a comment unrelated to an unlawful discriminatory animus. Both statements are consistent with Washington Mutual's stated commitment to build leaders internally based on available resources within the corporation. Accordingly, Martinez's comments are not sufficient evidence of age discrimination.