Opinion ID: 1389898
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Plaintiffs' Disproportionate Assignment Claims

Text: All four of the plaintiffs allege that they were disproportionally assigned to what they refer to as an inferior job at the University's East St. Louis campus because of their race. An employee can support a Title VII claim for disparate treatment based on race using either the direct method to show that racial discrimination motivated the employment decision, or by relying on the indirect, burden-shifting method set forth in McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 93 S.Ct. 1817, 36 L.Ed.2d 668 (1973). See Sun v. Bd. of Trs. of Univ. of Ill., 473 F.3d 799, 812-14 (7th Cir.2007). The plaintiffs attempt to proceed under both methods. Regardless of which method they attempt to proceed under, they must show that they suffered a materially adverse employment action. See Lewis v. City of Chicago, 496 F.3d 645, 652-53 (7th Cir.2007) (citing Rhodes v. Ill. Dep't of Transp., 359 F.3d 498, 504 (7th Cir.2004)).
As we have stated previously, A materially adverse employment action is something `more disruptive than a mere inconvenience or an alteration of job responsibilities.' Rhodes, 359 F.3d at 504 (quoting Crady v. Liberty Nat'l Bank & Trust Co. of Ind., 993 F.2d 132, 136 (7th Cir.1993)). While adverse employment actions extend beyond readily quantifiable losses, not everything that makes an employee unhappy is an actionable adverse action. O'Neal v. City of Chicago, 392 F.3d 909, 911 (7th Cir.2004). Otherwise, minor and even trivial employment actions that an irritable, chip-on-the-shoulder employee did not like would form the basis of a discrimination suit. Id. Thus, for purposes of Title VII, we have articulated three general categories of actionable, materially adverse employment actions: (1) cases in which the employee's compensation, fringe benefits, or other financial terms of employment are diminished, including termination; (2) cases in which a nominally lateral transfer with no change in financial terms significantly reduces the employee's career prospects by preventing her from using her skills and experience, so that the skills are likely to atrophy and her career is likely to be stunted; and (3) cases in which the employee is not moved to a different job or the skill requirements of her present job altered, but the conditions in which she works are changed in a way that subjects her to a humiliating, degrading, unsafe, unhealthful, or otherwise significantly negative alteration in her workplace environment. Id. (citing Herrnreiter v. Chicago Hous. Auth., 315 F.3d 742, 744-45 (7th Cir.2002) (citations omitted)). We have cautioned, however, that cases in the second category are to be distinguished from cases involving a purely lateral transfer, that is, a transfer that does not involve a demotion in form or substance. Id. Further, `[a] transfer involving no reduction in pay and no more than a minor change in working conditions will not do, either.' Id. at 911-12 (quoting Williams v. Bristol-Myers Squibb Co., 85 F.3d 270, 274 (7th Cir. 1996)). The plaintiffs assert that their assignment to the East St. Louis campus constitutes a materially adverse employment action because the policing requirements at the larger Edwardsville campus are more interesting and intensive. For instance, the plaintiffs claim that officers working on the Edwardsville campus perform the interesting, varied and challenging work of real police officers . . . which include[s] enforcing traffic laws, making arrests and investigating crimes. The plaintiffs conversely assert that officers working on the East St. Louis campus perform the boring repetitive and semiskilled work of mere security guards, which involve[s] monitoring hallways and patrolling buildings. The University counters that three of the four plaintiffs directly or indirectly requested assignment to the East St. Louis campus, and that the University does not distinguish between an officer's service at a particular campus in making salary or promotion decisions. This case is analogous to O'Neal v. City of Chicago, 392 F.3d 909 (7th Cir.2004), so we turn to that decision for guidance. In O'Neal, a police officer was transferred from the narcotics unit to a beat sergeant position. Id. at 910. The officer complained that while both positions carried the same rank, her former position gave her increased opportunities for overtime pay, more supervisory responsibilities, and additional perks, such as the use of a work-provided cellular telephone, pager, vehicle, and parking space, as well as having most weekends and holidays off. Id. at 912. We affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment, holding that the officer's complaints about the transfer reveal only a `purely subjective preference for one position over another,' which does not `justify trundling out the heavy artillery of federal antidiscrimination law.' Id. at 913 (quoting Herrnreiter, 315 F.3d at 745). In this case, the plaintiffs' claim is even weaker than the officer's in O'Neal. The plaintiffs here argued only that they preferred the work at the Edwardsville campus, and that claim is contradicted by three of the four plaintiffs' specific or contingent requests to work at the very location they purport to disdain. Further, in this case there is no evidence that their assignment to the East St. Louis campus impacted the plaintiffs' salary, perks, or opportunities for future advancement. This indicates that the plaintiffs' complaints involved purely subjective preference for one assignment over another. The plaintiffs thus failed to allege a materially adverse employment action. Accordingly, the district court did not err in finding that, under either the direct or indirect method, the plaintiffs failed to proffer sufficient evidence to support their claim that the Department disproportionally assigned its officers based on race, or in granting summary judgment in favor of the University on that claim.
Moreover, even if the plaintiffs had alleged a materially adverse employment action, they did not proffer sufficient evidence of the University's discriminatory motive in disproportionally assigning them to work at the East St. Louis campus to create a triable issue under the direct method. See Rudin v. Lincoln Land Cmty. Coll., 420 F.3d 712, 721 (7th Cir. 2005) (stating that a plaintiff proceeding according to the direct method can avoid summary judgment for the other party by `creat[ing] a triable issue of whether the adverse employment action of which [s]he complains had a discriminatory motivation.' (quoting Wallace v. SMC Pneumatics, Inc., 103 F.3d 1394, 1397 (7th Cir. 1997)) (alteration in original)). A plaintiff proceeding according to the direct method may rely on either direct or circumstantial evidence. Sun, 473 F.3d at 812. Direct evidence is evidence which, if believed by the trier of fact, will prove the particular fact in question without reliance upon inference or presumption. Rudin, 420 F.3d at 720. Circumstantial evidence of discrimination is evidence which allows the trier of fact to infer intentional discrimination by the decisionmaker. Sun, 473 F.3d at 812. In this case, under the direct method, the plaintiffs claim that they have both direct and circumstantial evidence of discrimination. The plaintiffs claim that Chief Harrison's alleged statement that the administration at East St. Louis wanted to see more `black faces' among [its] police force constitutes direct evidence of the Department's discriminatory motive. We have previously stated that an employer's statement that he made an employment decision based upon racial animus qualifies as direct evidence of discriminatory motive. See, e.g., Rudin, 420 F.3d at 720 (`[D]irect evidence would be what [the employer] said or did in the specific employment decision in question.' For example, evidence that an employer `said he discharged [the plaintiff] because he is black' constitutes direct evidence. (quoting Plair v. E.J. Brach & Sons, Inc., 105 F.3d 343, 347 (7th Cir.1997)) (alterations in original)). We have held, however, that stray remarks that are neither proximate nor related to the employment decision are insufficient to defeat summary judgment. Sun, 473 F.3d at 813. Further, the statements of a person who lacks the final decision-making authority may be probative of intentional discrimination, but only if that individual exercised a significant degree of influence over the contested decision. Id. Here, the statement at issue purports to be a suggestion from someone in the East St. Louis campus administration to Chief Harrison to assign more black officers to that predominantly black campus. This statement fails to constitute direct evidence of the Department's alleged discriminatory motive because the Department's command staff, and ultimately Chief Harrison, are solely responsible for assigning Department officers to the two campuses. There is no evidence in the record to indicate that Chief Harrison was in any way influenced by or acted upon any such suggestion by one or more members of the East St. Louis administration. Chief Harrison, who was the final decisionmaker regarding campus assignments, testified that he explicitly rejected any such suggestion, and he stated that his assignment decisions were not based upon the plaintiffs' or any other officer's race. [5] Additionally, notes taken at a meeting between Chief Harrison and other officers indicate that the suggestion to assign officers based on race was discussed and Chief Harrison rejected it. Finally, there also is no evidence in the record from which to conclude which individual or individuals from the East St. Louis campus made the suggestions to Chief Harrison, nor is there any evidence indicating that the individual or individuals had any authority whatsoever over Chief Harrison or any other officer in the Department. The plaintiffs also attempt to proffer circumstantial evidence to prove the University's discriminatory motive under the direct method. Specifically, the plaintiffs offer what they assert is statistical evidence that the Department disproportionally assigned them to the East St. Louis campus because of their race. We have recognized three types of circumstantial evidence of intentional discrimination: (1) suspicious timing, ambiguous oral or written statements, or behavior toward or comments directed at other employees in the protected group; (2) evidence, whether or not rigorously statistical, that similarly situated employees outside the protected class received systematically better treatment; and (3) evidence that the employee was qualified for the job in question but was passed over in favor of a person outside the protected class and the employer's reason is a pretext for discrimination. Id. at 812 (citing Rudin, 420 F.3d at 720-21). The plaintiffs' evidence falls into the second category. As we have stated previously, a plaintiff may use pattern evidence of disparate treatment even if that evidence is not rigorously statistical, although, standing alone, it is insufficient evidence to withstand summary judgment. Id. at 813 (stating that [a]lthough the [plaintiff's] sample size is insufficient to provide statistically reliable evidence, the [university's promotion and tenure committee's] voting pattern has some probative value regarding discriminatory employment practices; however, a questionable pattern of promotion, standing alone is insufficient evidence to withstand summary judgment). In this case, the plaintiffs' statistics show that, from the 2001 summer semester through the 2002 fall semester, the four plaintiffs collectively received seventeen semester assignments, which were broken down between eleven assignments to the East St. Louis campus (61%), and six assignments to the Edwardsville campus (39%). In contrast, during that same time period, the Department's eighteen white officers collectively received fifty-nine semester assignments, which were broken down between fifteen assignments to the East St. Louis campus (25.4%), and forty-four assignments to the Edwardsville campus (74.6%). Individually, the four plaintiffs were assigned to the East St. Louis campus for the following percentage of their semester assignments during that time period: Owoseni 80%; Watson 66.6%; Smith 60%; and Nichols 40%. With the exception of Nichols, the plaintiffs' statistics do show that the Department assigned them to work at the East St. Louis campus more frequently than the Edwardsville campus. The plaintiffs' statistics, however, omit a critical variable in the Department's assignment process: the plaintiffs' own requests to work at the East St. Louis campus. The record shows that both Watson and Smith specifically requested to work at the St. Louis campus, and Owoseni indirectly requested to work at that campus when he requested to work with a sergeant who was primarily assigned there. The plaintiffs' own statistics evince that the only one of them who did not request to work at the East St. Louis campus, Nichols, was assigned to the Edwardsville campus the majority of the time. Accordingly, the mere fact that the Department assigned three of the plaintiffs to work at the East St. Louis campus for the majority of their semester assignments, when each of those plaintiffs either specifically or contingently requested to work there, is not sufficient circumstantial evidence to proceed under the direct method.