Opinion ID: 1436568
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Mr. McFarland's Claims of Retaliation

Text: After appellant McFarland presented his evidence of retaliation during three days of trial, Judge Dixon entered judgment against him. When evaluating appellant's arguments that this ruling was error, we will consider only the evidence presented to the jury. We discern no error and affirm.
We review [the granting of] a motion for judgment as a matter of law by applying the same standard as the trial court. Majeska v. District of Columbia, 812 A.2d 948, 950 (D.C.2002) (citing Pazmino v. Washington Metro. Area Transit Auth., 638 A.2d 677, 678 (D.C.1994)). A [judgment as a matter of law] is proper only if there is no evidentiary foundation, including all rational inferences from the evidence, by which a reasonable juror could find for the party opposing the motion, considering all the evidence in the light most favorable to that party. Id. (quoting Pazmino, 638 A.2d at 678). When viewing the evidence, the court must take care to avoid weighing the evidence, passing on the credibility of witnesses or substituting its judgment for that of the jury. If it is possible to derive conflicting inferences from the evidence, the trial judge should allow the case to go to the jury. Id. (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). The jury, however, may not be allowed to engage in idle speculation. Speculation is not the province of a jury, for the courts of this jurisdiction have emphasized the distinction between the logical deduction and mere conjecture. Id. (quoting Jones v. Safeway Stores, Inc., 314 A.2d 459, 460-61 (D.C.1974)). Under the DCHRA, it is an unlawful discriminatory practice to . . . retaliate against . . . any person . . . on account of having exercised . . . any right granted or protected under this chapter. D.C.Code § 2-1402.61(a) (2001). To make out a prima facie case of retaliation, the plaintiff must establish: (1)[he] was engaged in a protected activity, or that [he] opposed practices made unlawful by the DCHRA; (2) the employer took an adverse personnel action against [him]; and (3) a causal connection existed between the two. Howard University v. Green, 652 A.2d 41, 45 (D.C.1994). Mr. McFarland asserts that he was denied promotion and was terminated in retaliation for filing the August 14, 1997, grievance with the EEA; he also claims that his termination was in retaliation for sending the April 14, 1999, letter to the Human Resources department requesting information about the process used to select the new CEEP Director. Whether actions by an employee constitute protected activity is a question of law, and we therefore review the trial courts' conclusions de novo.  Carter-Obayuwana v. Howard University, 764 A.2d 779, 790 (D.C.2001) (citing Green, 652 A.2d at 45-47). Protected activity need not take the form of a lawsuit or of a formal complaint to an enforcement agency. . . . [It] extend[s] to an employee's informal complaints of discrimination to his or her superiors within the organization. Carter-Obayuwana, 764 A.2d at 790-91.

When appellant McFarland filed his grievance with the EEA in 1997, he specifically alleged that his male supervisor harassed him, discriminated against him on the basis of sex, and retaliated against him for an earlier complaint. Filing that grievance constituted protected activity and established the first prong of a prima facie case of retaliation. See, e.g., Carter-Obayuwana, 764 A.2d at 791. There is no dispute that the second prong of a prima facie case has been established  that an adverse personnel action was taken.
However, Mr. McFarland failed to establish a causal connection between his filing of the 1997 grievance and GW's failure to promote him in 1998 or its decision to terminate him in 1999. For purposes of meeting the requirement of a prima facie case, [t]he causal connection . . . may be established by showing that the employer had knowledge of the employee's protected activity, and that the adverse personnel action took place shortly after that activity. Arthur Young, 631 A.2d at 368 (quoting Mitchell v. Baldrige, 245 U.S.App. D.C. 60, 66, 759 F.2d 80, 86 (1985)). Employer awareness that the employee is engaged in protected activity is . . . essential to making out a prima facie case for retaliation. Green, 652 A.2d at 46. Mr. McFarland argues that the jury was entitled to draw inferences of causation from the sequence of events  that he was denied promotion in November 1998 and terminated in April 1999 after filing his August 1997 grievance  but tracing the sequence quickly exposes an inconvenient fact. After he had filed his August 1997 discrimination complaint, McFarland was promoted to the position of Marketing Manager (in September 1997). It is highly improbable that an employer so offended by an employee's complaint as to fire him in retaliation would first promote him. See Brady v. Houston Independent School District, 113 F.3d 1419, 1424 (5th Cir.1997) (that a plaintiff was promoted after filing a complaint of discrimination is utterly inconsistent with an inference of retaliation). Even more damaging (indeed, fatal) to appellant McFarland's theory is the complete absence of evidence showing that any individual responsible for either hiring Ms. Hunter in 1998 or terminating Mr. McFarland in 1999 knew about the August 1997 grievance. As we have said, [i]t simply defies logic to charge an employer with acting in retaliation for an action of which the employer was not, in fact, made aware. Green, 652 A.2d at 48. Lacking evidence that the individuals who made the adverse personnel decisions knew of his protected activity, Mr. McFarland argues that this court should impute knowledge to the institution as a whole. His argument is inconsistent with the prevailing federal view that, in order to establish the element of causation in a retaliation claim, an employee must show that the decision-makers responsible for the adverse action had actual knowledge of the protected activity. See Brungart v. BellSouth Telecommunications, Inc., 231 F.3d 791, 800 (11th Cir.2000) (rejecting imputed knowledge theory; [T]he fact the employer is a corporation does not relieve a plaintiff of the burden of showing a causal connection between the protected conduct and the decision to take the adverse employment action.); see also Raad v. Fairbanks North Star Borough School District, 323 F.3d 1185, 1197-98 (9th Cir. 2003) (decision-maker must have knowledge of protected activity to find an employment action retaliatory); Gupta v. Florida Board of Regents, 212 F.3d 571, 590 (11th Cir.2000) (To establish a causal connection, a plaintiff must show that the decision-makers were aware of the protected conduct, and that the protected activity and the adverse action were not wholly unrelated.) (citations, internal brackets, and quotation marks omitted); Sanchez v. Denver Public Schools, 164 F.3d 527, 533-34 (10th Cir.1998) (plaintiff failed to establish a prima facie case of retaliation because there was no evidence that the decision-maker knew of the plaintiff's protected conduct). The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit has explained that [i]t is not sufficient that [the defendant] could or even should have known about [the plaintiff's] complaints; [the decision-maker] must have had actual knowledge of the complaints for her decisions to be retaliatory. Luckie v. Ameritech Corp., 389 F.3d 708, 715 (7th Cir.2004) (emphasis in original). Accord, Tomanovich v. City of Indianapolis & Indiana Dep't of Transportation, 457 F.3d 656, 669 (7th Cir.2006) ([I]f an employer did not know the plaintiff made any complaints, it cannot be trying to penalize him for making them. (internal quotation marks and citation omitted)). The Seventh Circuit's reasoning that an employer cannot take actions against an employee in retaliation for that employee's protected activity without first having knowledge of that activity echoes our reasoning in Green. Although we have not specifically ruled on the issue of individual knowledge in the context of employment discrimination, our decision in Jung v. George Washington University, 875 A.2d 95 (D.C.2005), is fully consistent with Luckie and the prevailing federal view, and it foreshadows our decision here. [9] In Jung, a Ph.D. candidate failed his comprehensive oral examination, which was conducted before a panel of professors less than a year after he settled a race discrimination suit against the university. Id. at 101. Jung then sued the university under the DCHRA, claiming that the professors failed him in retaliation for his previous discrimination suit. Id. We upheld the trial court's decision granting judgment for the university as a matter of law because the student failed to establish a causal connection between his protected activity and his poor marks on the exam. There was uncontradicted testimony that the professors administering and evaluating the exam had no knowledge of the prior lawsuit. Id. at 113-14 (citing Green, 652 A.2d at 46). Although Jung is not an employment case, it solidly supports the general principle that the plaintiff must provide evidence that the decision-makers who took the adverse action knew about his protected activity. Jung, 875 A.2d at 113. To hold otherwise would invite speculation about the very essence of a retaliation claim  the motivational link between the adverse action and the protected activity. In evaluating Judge Dixon's decision to grant judgment as a matter of law, we must look solely to the evidence presented to the jury (and reasonable inferences drawn therefrom). Appellant McFarland offered no evidence that any of the seven members of the selection committee involved in hiring Mattie Hunter knew about his August 1997 grievance. He called only two of them at trial but did not ask Caroline James whether she knew about his grievance. Roger Whitaker denied knowing of that grievance, and there was no contradictory evidence. [10] Appellant McFarland offers an alternative theory that would make knowledge of the decision-makers irrelevant. He testified that he submitted his application to the Human Resources department, and he asserts in his brief that Deborah McDonald and Tom Rogers of that department knew of the letter he sent to Treasurer Lou Katz in September 1997 in connection with the August grievance. According to Mr. McFarland, a jury could find that McDonald and Rogers knew about the grievance. He then links this knowledge to GW's inability to produce his application. As presented at oral argument, Mr. McFarland basically is suggesting that someone behind the scenes at GW deep-sixed his application for the position of CEEP Director, and did so in retaliation for his August 1997 complaint. There are many problems with this theory. For example, Ms. McDonald testified that she did not know about the August grievance, and she did not remember the September letter. [11] McFarland presented no evidence that Rogers knew about either the August grievance or the September letter. Moreover, McFarland simply assumes that his application never reached the selection committee because one of the two members he called did not remember seeing it (the other member was not asked), and because GW could not produce the application in discovery. (Of course, McFarland could not produce a copy either.) GW's record keeping may leave something to be desired, but there is no evidence to establish that someone behind the scenes prevented the selection committee from considering McFarland's application. Our review is disciplined by the consideration that where plaintiff's evidence invites the jury to speculate as to negligence or causation a directed verdict is properly granted. Jimenez v. Hawk, 683 A.2d 457, 461 (D.C.1996) (citing Pepsi Cola Co. v. Waddell, 304 A.2d 630, 632 (D.C.1973)). Here, Mr. McFarland's alternative theory of causation is the nebulous hypothesis that someone took action to prevent him from being considered by the selection committee. Without more, this is simply too shaky a platform to support a retaliation claim. [A] jury should never be permitted to guess as to a material element of the case such as damages, negligence, or causation. Jimenez, 683 A.2d at 461-62 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Even viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to Mr. McFarland, it is far too speculative to infer that someone, either acting alone or in conspiracy with someone else in Human Resources, intentionally failed to pass on Mr. McFarland's application to the search committee and did so in retaliation for the August 1997 complaint.

In order for activity to qualify as protected, a plaintiff is required to `alert the employer [and make the employer aware of the fact] that [he or] she is lodging a complaint about allegedly discriminatory conduct.' Carter-Obayuwana, 764 A.2d at 791 (quoting Green, 652 A.2d at 46) (editing in Carter-Obayuwana ). The employee need not . . . employ any `magic words' such as `discrimination,' for `the communication of a complaint of unlawful discrimination . . . may be inferred or implied ' from the surrounding facts. Id. (quoting Green, 652 A.2d at 47). However, `[t]he onus is on the employee to clearly voice [his] opposition to receive the protections provided by the Act'; general complaints about `workplace favoritism' or other conduct not actionable under the DCHRA do not put the employer on the required notice. Daka, Inc. v. McCrae, 839 A.2d 682, 690 (D.C.2003) (quoting Green, 652 A.2d at 48). Mr. McFarland's April 14, 1999, letter did ask questions about the CEEP Director position and why he had not been interviewed. The letter also contained several questions which might be interpreted as indicating that Mr. McFarland was disappointed that GW had not promoted him. However, the letter does not allege discrimination or retaliation of any kind, it does not assert any facts that would support an allegation of that nature, and it does not refer to any of his previous complaints to EEA. Even if Mr. McFarland's letter is read as signaling a general dissatisfaction with the fact that he was passed over for the promotion, it does not clearly complain about unlawful discrimination. [12] Indeed, it is far from clear that the letter is complaining about anything at all. [13] We recognize that engaging in protected activity under the DCHRA does not require the recitation of magic words, but alleging discrimination is so easily accomplished that we need not sweep in the generic concerns of any disappointed employee who is passed over while a peer is promoted. . . . Gold v. Gallaudet College, 630 F.Supp. 1176, 1187 (D.D.C.1986). This reasoning is particularly compelling in this case, given that Mr. McFarland, having previously filed a discrimination and retaliation complaint with the EEA, certainly knew how to do so. [14] However, we need not finally decide whether we agree with Judge Dixon's legal conclusion that the letter did not constitute protected activity, because, as we now discuss, there was no causal connection between the letter and the decision to terminate appellant.
Mr. McFarland claims that Deborah McDonald's role in his termination creates a genuine issue of material fact because she possibly knew of his April 14, 1999, letter. This argument has no merit. Ms. McDonald testified that she consulted on the proposal to eliminate McFarland's position, and she drafted the letter informing him of his termination, but she was not aware of his April 14 letter to Rogers. It is not clear how many days before April 19 Deborah McDonald provided the draft termination letter to Ms. Hunter, but there could be no rational inference that Ms. McDonald learned of the letter and, in reaction, it somehow influenced the decision to eliminate Mr. McFarland's position. That decision was made before McFarland wrote his letter. At oral argument, counsel for appellant conceded that Ms. Hunter had no knowledge of Mr. McFarland's complaints at the time she decided to eliminate his position. Ms. Hunter formally proposed that step in a February 3, 1999, memo and had met with the HR department about eliminating Mr. McFarland's Marketing Manager position as early as January of 1999. Although final approval was given shortly before Mr. McFarland was notified that his position had been eliminated, it would be speculation to suggest that that decision was influenced by knowledge of the April 14 letter.
Because appellant McFarland produced no evidence that the decision-makers knew he had filed a grievance in 1997, he failed to prove that they denied him a promotion or eliminated his job in retaliation for that protected activity. Even assuming for the sake of argument that McFarland's April 14, 1999, inquiry constituted protected activity, a jury would have to speculate in order to find a causal link between that letter and the decision to eliminate McFarland's job. Therefore, Judge Dixon properly granted GW's motion for judgment as a matter of law. See Majeska, 812 A.2d at 950.