Opinion ID: 669656
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Sufficiency of the Evidence on the Title VII Claims

Text: 74 DFY, Albrecht, Yeres, and Maffia contend that the evidence was insufficient to support the jury's advisory verdict and the district court's findings of fact with respect to Cornwell's disparate-treatment claims. This contention need not detain us long. 75 A trial court's findings of fact may not be set aside unless they are clearly erroneous. See Fed.R.Civ.P. 52(a); Anderson v. Bessemer City, 470 U.S. 564, 573-74, 105 S.Ct. 1504, 1511-12, 84 L.Ed.2d 518 (1985). Findings of discrimination, discriminatory intent, and causation are findings of fact, see, e.g., id. at 573, 105 S.Ct. at 1511 (discrimination); Pullman-Standard v. Swint, 456 U.S. 273, 287-90, 102 S.Ct. 1781, 1789-91, 72 L.Ed.2d 66 (1982) (discriminatory intent); United States v. Yonkers Board of Education, 837 F.2d 1181, 1218 (2d Cir.1987), cert. denied, 486 U.S. 1055, 108 S.Ct. 2821, 100 L.Ed.2d 922 (1988), and are subject to review under the clearly erroneous standard. Similarly, whether a given employment policy evinces an intent to discriminate and whether reasons advanced by an employer are pretextual are pure questions of fact, findings as to which are to be reviewed under the same standard. Krieger v. Gold Bond Building Products, 863 F.2d 1091, 1098 (2d Cir.1988). 76 Where there are two permissible views of the evidence, the factfinder's choice between them cannot be clearly erroneous. Anderson v. Bessemer City, 470 U.S. at 574, 105 S.Ct. at 1511. Similarly, if a trial judge's finding is based on his decision to credit the testimony of one of two or more witnesses, each of whom has told a coherent and facially plausible story that is not contradicted by extrinsic evidence, that finding, if not internally inconsistent, can virtually never be clear error. Id. at 575, 105 S.Ct. at 1512. 77 Given the evidence of DFY's policies recounted in Part I above, and the evidence of Cornwell's repeated requests to Albrecht, Yeres, Maffia, and Centeno, her superiors at DFY, for remedial action, requests that rarely led to any disciplinary action and led to no surcease in the harassing conduct, we cannot conclude that the trial court's findings with respect to Cornwell's claims of discriminatory treatment are clearly erroneous.