Court Opinion

ID: 9488516
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 12:47:39.361464+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:52:56.059483
License: Public Domain

RONEY, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
Reluctantly, because Judge Flaum has written a well-reasoned opinion for the Court and I agree with much of it, I dissent from the failure to affirm the district court’s decision to let stand the jury verdict as to liability for age discrimination. First, I think there were extrinsic facts sufficient to permit the admission of evidence that Pierce would not have signed the release if it was intended to bar his age discrimination claim. Second, I think the evidence supports the jury’s decision on a special verdict form: “Does the Release executed by plaintiff bar these claims?” The jury answered: “No.”
Pierce terminated two jobs with Santa Fe, not one. His discrimination claims are based on his earlier discharge as a Senior Analyst, and are not based on his resignation from his final job with Santa Fe as an Assistant File Clerk for which he received termination pay.
Pierce successfully asserted to the district court that since he has held several different positions while at Santa Fe, the clause “my preceding employment relationship” in the release became ambiguous. Was it the immediate employment relationship, or every employment relationship? If the general language of the release would carry the day, what is the significance of the specific reference to an employment relationship? Pierce squarely rejected the severance payment and release that he was offered when he was fired from the Senior Analyst position. Mr. Pacoeha, who dealt with Pierce on behalf of the employer, admittedly told him at first that he did not think the release here involved covered Pierce’s EEOC complaint. Pacoeha disputes Pierce’s testimony that this was repeated at the time of the release, but that factual issue was a jury question. It is clear that no change in language was sug*576gested by the employer to remove doubt. Nor did Santa Fe ask for the dismissal of the EEOC action or, apparently, even raise the release in response to Pierce’s EEOC claim until after the filing of this lawsuit. Paeocha testified that the discrimination claim was not considered when the amount to be paid for the release was determined.
Contrary to the Court’s view, I think the use of parol evidence here was properly allowed pursuant to the “extrinsic ambiguity” doctrine, which permits for the admission of parol evidence, when, despite the fact that a “contract seem[s] clear on its face, [it, nonetheless, implicates] certain background facts [that] show that its plain meaning is not its true meaning — that the parties couldn’t have meant what they seem to have said, that they must have been using words in a special way.” Matter of Stoecker, 5 F.3d 1022, 1029-30 (7th Cir.1993). At the very least, it seems to me, the issue is close enough to let stand the decision of the district court, generally granted some latitude in evidentiary matters.
Moreover, as the Court has noted, in the civil rights context, the Court must determine whether the release was entered into “knowingly and voluntarily.” Riley v. American Family Mutual Insurance Co., 881 F.2d 368, 373-74 (7th Cir.1989). Voluntariness and knowledge may be called into question where, as here, a “plaintiff was not represented by counsel and possessed a limited education, executed a standard general release form prepared by the employer, or was unable to appreciate the consequences of the release.” Id. at 374 (citations omitted).
Among other instructions, the jury was told that the release would not bar the discrimination claims if the parties did not contemplate waiving the previously asserted discrimination claims, and that Santa Fe had the burden of proving that Pierce executed the release knowingly and voluntarily.
We cannot be sure what ground the jury relied upon in answering the special verdict question that the release did not bar the claim, but with the proper admission of evidence and with proper instructions, it seems to me that the district court’s decision not to set aside the jury verdict as to liability should be affirmed.
I concur in the way that the Court’s opinion has decided the other issues on appeal.