Opinion ID: 2994947
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: McDonnell Douglas Indirect Method of

Text: Proof
A plaintiff may show that his employer discriminated against him because of his race or his age by using the burden-shifting method set forth by the Supreme Court in McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792 (1973)./6 Under McDonnell Douglas, a plaintiff first must establish a prima facie case of discrimination./7 A plaintiff establishes a prima facie case of discrimination by demonstrating that: (1) he belongs to a protected class, (2) he performed his job according to his employer’s legitimate expectations, (3) he suffered an adverse employment action, and (4) similarly situated employees outside the protected class were treated more favorably by the defendant. See Pitasi, 184 F.3d at 716; Sirvidas, 60 F.3d at 377; Hughes v. Brown, 20 F.3d 745, 746 (7th Cir. 1994). Once the plaintiff has established his prima facie case, a presumption of discrimination arises, and the burden shifts to the defendant to come forward with evidence of a legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason for discharging the plaintiff. See Pitasi, 184 F.3d at 716./8 If the defendant meets its burden, the burden shifts back to the plaintiff to show that the defendant’s stated reason for the adverse action was a pretext for discrimination. See McDonnell Douglas, 411 U.S. at 804; Stewart, 207 F.3d at 376; Pitasi, 184 F.3d at 716. If the plaintiff meets his respective burdens under McDonnell Douglas, summary judgment is inappropriate; a plaintiff need not come forward with direct evidence of discrimination in order to survive summary judgment. See Vanasco v. National-Louis Univ., 137 F.3d 962, 965 (7th Cir. 1998) (The plaintiff may prove her case in one of two ways--through direct evidence or via the indirect burden- shifting method of McDonnell Douglas . . . . Under either method, summary judgment is improper if the plaintiff offers evidence from which an inference of age discrimination may be drawn.) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted).
At the outset, we note that not all elements of the McDonnell Douglas analysis are at issue. The parties do not dispute that Mr. Gordon belongs to a protected class or that he suffered an adverse employment action. Therefore, in determining whether Mr. Gordon has established a prima facie case, we need to consider only (1) whether Mr. Gordon was meeting the legitimate expectations of United at the time of his discharge and (2) whether similarly situated employees outside the protected class were treated more favorably. See Pitasi, 184 F.3d at 716.
We first turn to whether Mr. Gordon was meeting the legitimate expectations of United. As we have pointed out on several occasions, this issue of satisfactory job performance often focuses on the same circumstances as must be scrutinized with respect to the matter of pretext./9 Consequently, we will address the issue more comprehensively when we discuss pretext. Nevertheless, several factors ought to be pointed out here. First, to put it mildly, United has not spoken with one voice in defining what sort of activity by a flight attendant constitutes an unauthorized deviation. The record discloses a distinct inability on the part of United’s management to provide any consistent definition. Different individuals in management positions articulated very different views on what sort of activity on the part of an employee constituted this violation of United’s Code of Conduct. Indeed, it is no wonder that United had difficulty in articulating a definition because, apparently, it had charged an employee with this offense only once before (and, in the prior situation, determined that discharge of the employee was not appropriate). We ordinarily would defer to the definition of the decision-maker in such a situation. However, the material before us on summary judgment is clearly susceptible to the interpretation that the individual who made the decision to terminate Mr. Gordon actually came to no independent conclusion on the matter but simply accepted the conclusion of lower ranking administrative personnel on this important, indeed key, definitional matter. Even if we were to assume that the decision-maker applied her own definition of unauthorized deviation, it is not at all clear that Mr. Gordon committed such an infraction. His account of his conversation with Velasco certainly would permit the trier of fact to conclude that he believed in good faith that he had sought and had been granted permission not to fly the LAX to Seattle leg that he had been assigned previously. In short, the invocation of an offense that, to this day, United has difficulty defining, the lack of any clear management decision that Mr. Gordon’s conduct violated clearly established norms, and Mr. Gordon’s detailed account that he acted only with the permission of those responsible for the coordination of flight attendant assignments raise a genuine issue of material fact as to whether he had deviated at all from permissible patterns of behavior for flight attendants. Finally, United points to incidents in Mr. Gordon’s work history at United to support its contention that Mr. Gordon was not performing satisfactorily. When combining his work record with his unauthorized deviation, United asserts, it is clear that Mr. Gordon fails to meet this aspect of his prima facie case. Here too, however, there is a dispute as to whether United deviated from its established policy in considering past incidents after it had assured Mr. Gordon that these incidents would not be a matter of record. Mr. Gordon claims that his work record was not supposed to contain a notation of these incidents, and indeed, that United affirmatively had assured him that these matters would not be used in evaluations of his performance as a PFA. Moreover, Mr. Gordon asserts that all but one of these incidents were not relevant to his performance as a PFA. The remaining incident, his failure to provide the safety announcement when he was the First FA was not, according to Mr. Gordon, an infraction. Not only did Siemieniec tell Mr. Gordon that she would not include a report on the incident in his record, but the reports from the other FAs on the flight also indicate that Mr. Gordon did nothing wrong. Furthermore, United’s rules of procedure state that both the First FA and the Second FA are responsible for giving the announcement. Here, the Second FA explained that she had given the announcement and admitted that she had given it early. Therefore, viewing the record in the light most favorable to Mr. Gordon, his personnel file should not have contained a record of any infractions. His personnel file did show, however, many commendations. Consequently, a trier of fact could conclude on this record that Mr. Gordon was performing up to United’s expectations.
The fourth prong of the McDonnell Douglas analysis requires that Mr. Gordon establish that similarly situated employees outside the protected class were treated differently. We conclude that there is a genuine issue of triable fact on this matter as well. Mr. Gordon points to two different groups of similarly situated, non- protected employees who were treated more favorably than he. First, he and only one other PFA in United’s history have been charged with unauthorized deviation. The other PFA to receive such a designation was a white female, and United did not discharge her after her unauthorized deviation. Instead, it issued her a warning and allowed her to remain with United. Despite the absence of any warnings in his record, Mr. Gordon was terminated for the same conduct that resulted in only a warning for a white female employee. Although United suggests that the other PFA’s conduct was far less intentional, that conclusion is dependent upon the trier of fact’s interpretation of Mr. Gordon’s encounter with Velasco. As we already have noted, this encounter is open to different interpretations. Indeed, several other employees may well have been similarly situated to Mr. Gordon. These flight attendants all had missed flights unintentionally. If a trier of fact were to determine that Mr. Gordon had missed his assigned flight unintentionally--a conclusion supportable by the record--, he is similarly situated to these employees but was treated less favorably than they./10 Indeed, unlike Mr. Gordon, several of these PFAs already had warnings in their records at the time of their missed flights; United nevertheless characterized their actions as missed flights instead of unauthorized deviations. A trier of fact reasonably could determine that Mr. Gordon, like the other flight attendants, simply missed a flight but was treated differently from the other flight attendants. Drawing all reasonable inferences in Mr. Gordon’s favor, we must conclude that Mr. Gordon has demonstrated that there is a genuine issue of triable fact as to whether similarly situated employees outside the protected class were treated differently.
Assuming that United has offered a facially legitimate reason for Mr. Gordon’s discharge, his unauthorized deviation, we now turn to whether Mr. Gordon has demonstrated that United’s stated reason is a pretext for discrimination. See McDonnell Douglas, 411 U.S. at 804; Stewart, 207 F.3d at 376; Pitasi, 184 F.3d at 716.
To show pretext, Mr. Gordon bears the burden of demonstrating that United’s ostensible justification for its decision is unworthy of credence. See Reeves v. Sanderson Plumbing Products, Inc., 530 U.S. 133, 143 (2000); Adreani v. First Colonial Bankshares Corp., 154 F.3d 389, 395 (7th Cir. 1998); see also Sanchez v. Henderson, 188 F.3d 740, 746 (7th Cir. 1999) (stating that a plaintiff can show pretext by showing that the employer’s proffered reason was not worthy of belief), cert. denied, 528 U.S. 1173 (2000). Mr. Gordon may make the requisite showing by providing evidence tending to prove that the employer’s proffered reasons are factually baseless, were not the actual motivation for the discharge in question, or were insufficient to motivate the discharge. Adreani, 154 F.3d at 395 (internal quotation marks and citations omitted); see also Sanchez, 188 F.3d at 746. If United honestly believed its reason for discharging Mr. Gordon, Mr. Gordon cannot meet his burden. See Roberts v. Separators, Inc., 172 F.3d 448, 453 (7th Cir. 1999). This is true even if United’s reason for Mr. Gordon’s discharge was foolish or trivial or even baseless; as long as United honestly believed its reason, then summary judgment for United is appropriate. Brill v. Lante Corp., 119 F.3d 1266, 1270 (7th Cir. 1997); see also Crim v. Board of Educ. of Cairo Sch. Dist. No. 1, 147 F.3d 535, 541 (7th Cir. 1998) (explaining that it is not enough for the plaintiff to prove that the employer’s reason was doubtful or mistaken). Title VII sanctions employers who discriminate, not those who are simply inept or incompetent. Our cases have warned, repeatedly, that we do not sit as a superpersonnel department that will second guess an employer’s business decision. See Stewart, 207 F.3d at 378. However, we need not abandon good reason and common sense in assessing an employer’s actions. Indeed, we have stated that a determination of whether a belief is honest is often conflated with analysis of reasonableness, Flores v. Preferred Technical Group, 182 F.3d 512, 516 (7th Cir. 1999); the more objectively reasonable a belief is, the more likely it will seem that the belief was honestly held, id. Our cases therefore have acknowledged that we need not take an employer at its word. For instance, we have held that when an employee provides [a] detailed refutation of events which underlie the employer’s negative performance assessment, the employee demonstrates that the employer may not have honestly relied on the identified deficiencies in making its decision. Day v. Colt Constr. & Dev. Co., 28 F.3d 1446, 1460-61 (7th Cir. 1994). Furthermore, [i]f the employee offers specific evidence from which the finder of fact may reasonably infer that the proffered reasons do not represent the truth, the case then turns on the credibility of the witnesses. Collier v. Budd Co., 66 F.3d 886, 893 (7th Cir. 1995). In such circumstances, the employee creates a factual issue as to whether the employer’s explanation is credible or merely a pretext for discrimination. Day, 28 F.3d at 1461. [W]hen the sincerity of an employer’s asserted reasons for discharging an employee is cast into doubt, a fact finder may reasonably infer that unlawful discrimination was the true motivation . . . . Adreani, 154 F.3d at 395 (citations omitted).
In the present case, United’s proffered justification for firing Mr. Gordon is his unauthorized deviation. Our review of the record reveals inconsistencies in definition and disparities in application that call into question United’s proffered justification and make summary judgment inappropriate. 1. Mr. Gordon admits that he did not receive authorization before leaving Los Angeles to fly to Chicago. United now admits that, even though he had not received authorization, if he had returned to Los Angeles to make his scheduled flight, he would not have made an unauthorized deviation. United determined, however, that Mr. Gordon’s conduct constituted an unauthorized deviation./11 The record makes starkly clear that, at the time of the incident, United did not have a clear definition of what constitutes an unauthorized deviation. Apparently, the term is not defined in any United manual. Furthermore, the individuals involved in Mr. Gordon’s discharge employed different definitions of the term. Velasco offered a conflicting definition of unauthorized deviation from that of Siemieniec, the person who discharged Mr. Gordon. Velasco stated that a person commits an unauthorized deviation when he is on a layover and without authorization flies to another city, even if he returns to the city of his layover and makes his scheduled flight. Siemieniec explained in her deposition, however, that a flight attendant could fly to a different city while on a layover and return to his departure city without committing an unauthorized deviation. Siemieniec supported her definition by stating that [p]rovided he is back in position for his scheduled flight, he has not deviated. R.23, Siemieniec dep. I, at 81. James Younglove, the department’s acting manager, echoed Siemieniec’s deposition position that, if Mr. Gordon had flown home and returned in time to make his next scheduled flight, he would not have violated any United rule [a]s long as he [was] back in their [sic] position to fly his trip. R.21, Ex.15 at 46. Similarly, Glen Scoggins, a senior staff representative for labor relations, was presented with the following hypothetical: If a flight attendant is on layover and is scheduled to fly out of my hypothetical city at 8:00 at night . . . that flight attendant took a plane to Pittsburgh, had lunch, got back to the city in which she was scheduled to fly out of in time to make her flight, has that flight attendant violated United’s articles of conduct? R.23, Scoggins dep., at 19-20. Scoggins replied: I do not believe they violated the articles of conduct. Id. at 20. Indeed, United in its appellate brief flatly admits that the conduct that Velasco describes as an unauthorized deviation does not constitute such an infraction. The inconsistent definition of unauthorized deviation becomes even more troubling in light of several other events. First, Siemieniec relied upon Velasco’s definition of unauthorized deviation as a justification for firing Mr. Gordon, even though, according to her own deposition, she did not believe that his definition or the facts he alleged constituted an unauthorized deviation. Siemieniec’s application of a different definition than the one she articulated in her deposition raises a significant question about the truthfulness of United’s proffered reason for the discharge. Second, the unauthorized deviation infraction has been invoked rarely. United’s decision to characterize Mr. Gordon’s conduct as an unauthorized deviation was an almost unprecedented occurrence. Other employees, who engaged in facially similar conduct, received only interim warnings because their conduct was deemed a missed flight. It is not the province of this court to question an employer’s decision to punish some conduct more harshly than other conduct. Nevertheless, we are not bound by the labels that an employer uses and must scrutinize the conduct behind those labels to determine if they are applied to similar conduct. Cf. Johnson v. Zema Sys. Corp., 170 F.3d 734, 743 (7th Cir. 1999) (stating that [a]n employer cannot insulate itself from claims of racial discrimination simply by providing different job titles to each of its employees and then deny the existence of similarly situated employees). Here, an employer applied a rarely used label to sanction conduct that does not clearly fall within the chosen category. Although this alone may not cast doubt on United’s sincerity, when considered together with the inconsistency noted above, it is sufficient evidence of pretext and, therefore, precludes summary judgment. See Perdomo v. Browner, 67 F.3d 140, 145 (7th Cir. 1995) (Because a fact-finder may infer intentional discrimination from an employer’s untruthfulness, evidence that calls truthfulness into question precludes a summary judgment.). 2. However, although our analysis could stop here, there is additional evidence of pretext. United’s proffered reason for discharge is further placed in question because no one claims responsibility for making the determination that an unauthorized deviation actually took place. Velasco stated that, in his role as Supervisor of the Crew Desk, he had no authority to make decisions; instead, he merely acted as a conduit to Mr. Gordon’s supervisors. Velasco wrote in his report to Siemieniec that Mr. Gordon decided to DV8 from LAX back to ORD [O’Hare] without authorization from any crew desk, R.21, Ex.32; yet, as Mr. Velasco repeatedly stated in his deposition, he had no decision-making authority and his role was only to provide information as to what happen[ed] during their assignment and that is it. R.23, Velasco dep. I, at 68./12 United’s other supervisors, however, all claim that they did not make the decision that Mr. Gordon committed an unauthorized deviation. When Siemieniec was asked what factors she considered in making the determination that Mr. Gordon deviated without authorization, she replied: That was already complete by the time I got involved. That was something he was dealing with at the moment at the crew desk. That determination was between him and Henry [Velasco] at the crew desk. R.28, Ex.49 at 40. She then stated that Mr. Gordon unauthorized his own deviation. Id./13 These protestations, when considered together with the lack of coherent definition of unauthorized deviation cast significant and substantial doubt on United’s assertion that it honestly believed Mr. Gordon committed an unauthorized deviation. As a result, these circumstances demonstrate triable issues of fact as to whether United’s justification of its discharge of Mr. Gordon is unworthy of credence and therefore probative of intentional discrimination. Reeves, 530 U.S. at 147. We also note that Mr. Gordon and Velasco offer different accounts of the events leading to Mr. Gordon’s unauthorized deviation, a disparity which is relevant to the issue of whether United’s proffered reason for discharge is a credible one. Mr. Gordon states that, after a bad experience at his hotel, he presented himself to the Crew Desk to ask permission to be released from his next assignment. Velasco acknowledges that Mr. Gordon’s hotel experience was troubling but states that Mr. Gordon presented himself as illegal to fly. Mr. Gordon admits that he said he did not have a legal rest. He also states that he clearly would have had a legal rest by the time of his next flight and that Velasco had to have known that because Velasco had Mr. Gordon’s schedule in front of him on his computer screen. It is undisputed that Mr. Gordon offered to return to Los Angeles to complete his scheduled assignment. Therefore, the two individuals present at the time Mr. Gordon committed his alleged unauthorized deviation do not agree on the material facts of the occurrence. Mr. Gordon claims that he could have flown, and offered to fly, his next assigned flight. He states that he thought he received permission from Velasco to be removed. Velasco, conversely, states that Mr. Gordon presented himself as unable to fly his next assignment. United therefore claims that Mr. Gordon’s removal was not authorized. There is, therefore, a genuine issue of triable fact because, when a PFA deviates from his assignment with authorization, it is not an infraction. As Siemieniec states, when flight attendants get permission to take a different flight or do other than what they’re scheduled to do then it is not unauthorized. R.23, Siemieniec dep. I, at 82./14 According to Mr. Gordon, he asked for authority from Velasco to miss his next flight and Velasco seemingly provided that authorization. 3. Finally, the weakness of the proffered justification for the termination is further emphasized by the fact that the only other time that United has categorized an action as an unauthorized deviation, the involved employee, a white female, was not terminated. A showing that similarly situated employees belonging to a different racial group received more favorable treatment can also serve as evidence that the employer’s proffered legitimate, non- discriminatory reason for the adverse job action was a pretext for racial discrimination. Graham v. Long Island R.R., 230 F.3d 34, 43 (2d Cir. 2000); see also Williams v. City of Valdosta, 689 F.2d 964, 975 (11th Cir. 1982) (It is undisputed, however, that the City’s adherence to its formal promotional policy was inconsistent and arbitrary at best. This inconsistency supports the conclusion that resort to the examination requirement was a pretext for singling out Williams for unfavorable treatment.).
We note that in Reeves v. Sanderson Plumbing Products, Inc., 530 U.S. 133, 142-46 (2000), the Supreme Court, reinstating a jury verdict in favor of the employee, engaged in a similar factual analysis to ours in the present action to determine that a company’s explanation for its employment decision was suggestive of intentional discrimination. In Reeves, the employer contended that its discharge of the employee was due to a non-discriminatory reason: the employee’s failure to maintain accurate attendance records of those under his supervision. See id. at 138. Reviewing in detail the record before it, the Court determined that, contrary to the employer’s assertion, the evidence permitted the jury to conclude that the employee did maintain proper records and was not responsible for any failure to discipline late or absent employees. See id. at 144-47. As a result, the Court determined that sufficient evidence existed to sustain a jury’s determination that the employer’s asserted justification was not true. See id. at 154-55. As in Reeves, Mr. Gordon has raised a factual issue as to whether the employer’s explanation is credible or merely a pretext for discrimination. Day, 28 F.3d at 1461. Mr. Gordon’s argument that his discharge for unauthorized deviation was pretextual is not based on a contention that United simply misapplied its policy or that its decision-makers were confused. To so argue would be to misstate the record before us./15 Although United certainly ought to be permitted to argue such managerial ineptness to the jury, on summary judgment we must remember that Mr. Gordon suggests another, and equally plausible, characterization of the record. Our faithful adherence to the Supreme Court’s holding in Reeves will tolerate no other conclusion. A reasonable jury could conclude, given United’s inconsistent definition of unauthorized deviation, the rarity with which the unauthorized deviation provision was invoked, the disparate ways it was applied when it was invoked in Mr. Gordon’s case, and United’s inability to identify the management employee responsible for characterizing Mr. Gordon’s conduct, that United’s stated reason was a pretext for discrimination. [W]hen the sincerity of an employer’s asserted reasons for discharging an employee is cast into doubt, a fact finder may reasonably infer that unlawful discrimination was the true motivation. Adreani, 154 F.3d at 395 (citations omitted). Summary judgment is therefore inappropriate. See id.