Court Opinion

ID: 9499540
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 17:51:10.675295+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:59:34.443402
License: Public Domain

*806CLAY, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
The jury’s verdict should be upheld, inasmuch as the majority’s view of Federal Rule of Evidence 408 rests on an implausible reading of the Rule which cannot be reconciled with the intent of the Rule or the case law that was approved by the advisory committee’s note to Rule 408’s recent amendment. I would hold that the district court did not abuse its discretion, under the unique circumstances of this case, in admitting the evidence of settlement negotiations. Furthermore, there was substantial evidence admitted at trial to support the jury’s verdict. Accordingly, I would affirm the judgment of the district court.
I.
Under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, Pub.L. 90-902, 81 Stat. 602 (“ADEA”) (codified as amended at 29 U.S.C. § 621 et. seq.), it is “unlawful for an employer ... to discharge any individual ... because of such individual’s age.”1 29 U.S.C. § 623. A plaintiff alleging a claim under the ADEA is required to mitigate damages. See Skalka v. Fernald Envtl. Restoration Mgmt. Corp., 178 F.3d 414, 426 (6th Cir.1999). The defendant, however, bears the burden of demonstrating that the plaintiff failed to mitigate damages. See Shore v. Fed. Express Corp., 777 F.2d 1155, 1158 (6th Cir.1985) (sex discrimination); West v. Nabors Drilling USA, Inc., 330 F.3d 379, 393 (5th Cir.2003). An offer from the defendant to rehire the plaintiff in his previous position is relevant to the issue of mitigation; if the offer is unconditional, a defendant can use the plaintiffs refusal to accept the offer as evidence that the plaintiff failed to mitigate damages. Nagarajan v. Tenn. State Univ., 187 F.3d 637 (Table), No. 98-5169, 1999 WL 551360, at *4 (6th Cir. July 19, 1999) (unpublished) (citing Ford Motor Co. v. EEOC, 458 U.S. 219, 232, 102 S.Ct. 3057, 73 L.Ed.2d 721 (1982)).
In the case at bar, the substance of the settlement discussions at issue is contained in two letters (collectively the “Letters”). Defendants sent Plaintiff a letter “extend[ing] an offer of reinstatement of employment.” J.A. at 564. Plaintiff sent Defendants a letter that “accept[ed]” the offer of reinstatement, which Plaintiff understood to be unconditional, but interpreted the acceptance as not resolving all of his claims. J.A. at 565. Defendants claimed that their offer was conditional upon the release of Plaintiffs claims; Plaintiff then sought an order to enforce Defendants’ offer of reinstatement, which the district court denied. The district court construed Defendants’ offer as a settlement offer, and Plaintiffs response as a rejection-and-counter-offer. Plaintiff also argued that, in the event that the Letters did not constitute an agreement, he should be allowed to introduce evidence of the withdrawn offer to respond to Defendants’ claim that he failed to mitigate damages; Defendants argued that evidence of the Letters was barred by Federal Rule of Evidence 408. The district court denied Plaintiffs motion as premature, stating that, “as a tactical decision,” Defendants might not argue that Plaintiff failed to mitigate damages. J.A. at 58. After it become clear that Defendants intended to argue that Plaintiff failed to mitigate damages, the district court held that Defendants had a choice— they could argue mitigation, in which case *807evidence of the Letters could be admitted to rebut the claim that Plaintiff failed to mitigate damages, or in the event they did not argue mitigation, the evidence of the Letters would be excluded. If the evidence was admitted, the district court proposed (and Plaintiff agreed to) an instruction limiting the evidence to the issue of mitigation.
At trial, Defendants put the issue of mitigation into play by arguing that Plaintiff refused to accept employment offers that were available to him for reasons that were pretextual or unreasonable. Defendants’ theory of mitigation rested in part on convincing the jury that Plaintiff was not disposed to continue working as a dentist. As Defendants summarized the evidence at closing, Plaintiff made “excuses” for not finding employment, and did not have “the attitude of a man who wants to get back to work.” J.A. at 553.
The district court did not abuse its discretion when it held that, pursuant to Rule 408, Defendants opened the door by offering mitigation evidence, and hence Plaintiff could offer evidence that he was willing to accept what he interpreted to be an unconditional offer of employment. Although Rule 408 bars the admission of “[ejvidence of ... offering ... a valuable consideration in ... attempting to compromise a claim ... to prove ... [the claim’s] amount,” the Rule “does not require exclusion when the evidence is offered for another purpose.” When a party seeks to admit evidence of a settlement offer made by an opposing party to rebut the opposing party’s claim that the party seeking admission of the settlement offer failed to mitigate damages, that evidence is offered for “another purpose” under Rule 408. The evidence that Plaintiff was immediately ready to resume employment with Defendants was unquestionably relevant to the issue of mitigation. This evidence was properly admitted under Rule 408 to demonstrate that Plaintiff was willing to mitigate damages, and the district court gave an instruction limiting the use of the evidence to that purpose.
The most analogous case to the matter at hand is Urico v. Parnell Oil Co., 708 F.2d 852, 853-54 (1st Cir.1983). There, the First Circuit upheld the district court’s admission of settlement evidence offered for the purpose of mitigation. Id. at 854-55. The case involved an auto accident where Parnell Oil Co.’s (“Parnell”) truck rear-ended the Uricos’ truck on April 11, 1977. Id. at 853. The Uricos had leased their truck to a third party; as a consequence, they did not learn about the accident until June of 1977. Id. In August, when the truck had been repaired, the Uricos demanded that Parnell’s insurer, Bankers and Shippers Insurance Co. (“B & S”), pay to them the cost of the repairs to the truck plus $1,000 per week in damages resulting from their loss of the use of the truck. Id. at 853-54. B & S refused, but offered to pay for the repairs if the Uricos dropped their loss-of-use claim. Id. at 854. At trial, the Uricos sought to introduce the settlement offer to show that B & S’s refusal to pay for the repairs resulted in its failure to mitigate damages. Id. at 854-55. The court reasoned that the Uricos had a clear duty to take reasonable steps to mitigate damages, and the settlement evidence was admissible to demonstrate that B & S “unreasonably held [the Uricos’] truck hostage.” Id. Because the evidence was only offered on the issue of mitigation, it is unlikely that the Urico court would have allowed the evidence to be admitted had mitigation not been at issue.
Pierce v. F.R. Tripler & Co., the case most strongly relied upon by the majority, is not to the contrary. 955 F.2d 820, 826-28 (2d Cir.1992). In Pierce, the Second *808Circuit upheld the district court’s refusal to admit settlement evidence for mitigation under Rule 408. Id. at 823. The case involved an age discrimination suit where Pierce claimed that, in May of 1986, he was passed over for promotion to the position of General Manager in favor of a younger candidate. Id. In September, the defendant offered Pierce another financial position, although it was unclear whether accepting that position required a release of all of Pierce’s claims. Id. at 824. Pierce declined to accept the offer at the expense of his claims. Id. The district court refused to allow the defendant to admit this evidence, and the court of appeals affirmed. Id. at 826-28. The court of appeals held that the evidence went to the “amount” of the damages, and therefore was barred by Rule 408, although the court engaged in only the most cursory discussion of what constituted “another purpose” for which evidence is admissible under the Rule.2 Id. Thus, Pierce is distinguishable on its facts. In the instant case, the party opposing the admission of settlement evidence had raised the issue of the duty to mitigate damages by contending that Plaintiff failed to do so. By contrast, in Pierce, the party opposing the admission of the settlement evidence had not put the duty to mitigate damages into play. There is something deeply troubling about a defendant using Rule 408 settlement negotiations to place the plaintiff in a lose-lose situation, as occurred in Pierce: Accept the offer and the plaintiff must sacrifice his claims; decline the offer and the plaintiff has failed to mitigate damages. Where, as here, the defendant opens the door to mitigating evidence, no such unfairness occurs.
In addition to being consistent with Uri-co and the disposition of Pierce, the district court’s holding — that evidence of the Letters was admissible if and only if Defendants opened the door by arguing that Plaintiff failed to mitigate damages-is also consistent with the examples of “other purposes” set forth in the text of Rule 408. Specifically, this holding accords with Rule 408’s allowance of settlement evidence offered to “negat[e] a contention of undue delay.” The fact that Rule 408 uses the word “negate” suggests that, while evidence of a settlement may be relevant to rebut evidence that a party engaged in undue delay, this evidence cannot be admitted unless the door is first opened by a party raising the issue of undue delay. See Charles Alan Wright and Kenneth W. Graham, Jr., 23 Fed. Prac. & Proc. § 5312 (supp.2006) (“[T]he offeror cannot himself raise the issue of delay as a justification for the admission of the evidence.”). Evidence that a party failed to mitigate damages is analogous to evidence that a party’s claim is invalid because of undue delay. Although both types of evidence ultimately go to the “validity” or the “amount” of the claim, neither type of evidence “does [ ] so via any inference as to the belief [on the part of the offeror] in [the claim’s] validity arising from the offer to compromise.” Id. Since *809using the evidence for this purpose does not ask the factfinder to engage in impermissible reasoning — “because the defendant made the offer to settle, he must be liable” — using settlement evidence to negate a contention that the plaintiff failed to mitigate damages constitutes “another purpose” for which evidence is permissible.
This analogy also demonstrates the flaw in the majority’s simplistic claim that the “plain language” of Rule 408 excludes evidence that is relevant to the mitigation of damages because this evidence goes to the “amount” of the claim. According to the majority, “[t]he goal of mitigation is the prevention of unnecessary economic loss ... therefore mitigation necessarily goes to the amount of a claim.” Majority Op. at 798. Although this argument has some surface appeal, a close examination of Rule 408 demonstrates that this reading of the Rule must be rejected. Rule 408 does not exclude all evidence of settlement agreements. Under the majority’s reading of Rule 408, evidence of undue delay would be inadmissible, because it goes to “liability for ... a claim.” Fed.R.Evid. 408.
Likewise, the majority’s reading of Rule 408 is inconsistent with most or all of the formidable body of case law defining other permissible purposes. This body of law has developed in the thirty-plus years that Rule 408 has been in effect, and these purposes were recently approved by the advisory committee’s note to the 2006 amendment. See Fed.R.Evid. 408 advisory committee’s note (2006 amendment). Take, for example, the case of Athey v. Farmers Ins. Exch., 234 F.3d 357, 362 (8th Cir.2000), which was cited with approval in the advisory committee’s note to the 2006 amendment. In Athey, the plaintiff, Ath-ey, alleged, inter alia, that the defendant Farmer’s Insurance Co. (“Farmers”) (1) was liable to Athey for breach of contract; and (2) had acted in bad faith by failing to investigate Athey’s claims and delaying his settlement. Id. at 360. In support of his bad-faith claim, Athey was allowed to introduce evidence that Farmers had attempted to require him to release his bad-faith claim as a condition of its offer to settle his breach of contract claim. Id. at 361, 362. Under the majority’s “plain language” approach, the evidence should be excluded: Because the settlement evidence clearly “went to” the issue of Farmer’s liability for bad faith, the evidence would be excluded because the evidence is “offered to prove [Farmer’s] liability.” See Fed.R.Evid. 408. This reading of the Rule cannot be correct. The district court did not abuse its discretion in concluding that evidence offered to rebut a claim that Plaintiff failed to mitigate damages was offered for “another purpose.”
II.
Even though Rule 408 should not have barred the evidence that Dr. Stockman was willing to return to work for Defendants, such evidence still must clear the hurdle of Federal Rule of Evidence 403. Under Rule 403, the district court may exclude relevant evidence if “its probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice.” Fed.R.Evid. 403. “It is well settled that a trial judge’s discretion in balancing the probative value of evidence against its potential for unfair prejudice is very broad.” United States v. Bilderbeck, 163 F.3d 971, 978 (6th Cir.1999). In reviewing the district court’s evidentiary decisions under Rule 403, the trial court must give “ ‘the evidence its maximum reasonable probative force and its minimum reasonable prejudicial value.’ ” Paschal v. Flagstar Bank, 295 F.3d 565, 576 (6th Cir.2002) (quoting United States v. Schrock, 855 F.2d 327, 333 (6th Cir.1988)).
*810In conducting its analysis under Rule 403, the majority ignores the above rule, trivializing the probative value of the Letters and ignoring the district court’s efforts to minimize whatever prejudice might have resulted from their admission. The evidence that Plaintiff “accepted” Defendants’ offer was relevant on at least three different theories: (1) the evidence was relevant to future pay; (2) the evidence was directly relevant to whether Plaintiff attempted to mitigate his damages for the brief time period between the date of the settlement counter-offer and the end of trial, approximately one month; and (3) the evidence was relevant to whether Plaintiffs reasons for rejecting other offers of employment were pretextual or unreasonable. While the majority may be correct that (1) is of limited probative force, it completely ignores the other two bases of relevance. The fact that the settlement counter-offer was relevant to the sincerity of Plaintiffs refusal to accept other offers of employment is highly significant. During Plaintiffs cross-examination, and again at closing, Defendants attempted to demonstrate that Plaintiff did not accept other offers of employment for reasons that were pretextual or unreasonable. Plaintiff testified on cross-examination that he declined to pursue several job opportunities, for reasons that included the philosophy of the dental practice, the fact that one dental office was set up for left-handed dentists, and the fact that one dental practice was too far from his home. Defendants attempted to impeach Plaintiff by demonstrating that his professed motives were not his true motives, and argued during closing that his efforts to mitigate damages were not reasonable, and in truth, Plaintiff did not have a genuine desire to work. The fact that Plaintiff immediately accepted the “offer” to return to work for Defendants tends undermine this argument, by supporting an inference that he did desire work, which lends credibility to his proffered reasons for refusing other employment. Contrary to the majority’s contention, this testimony is relevant not only to future pay, but to the issue of mitigation over the entire period subsequent to Plaintiffs termination. Majority Op. at 799-800; see Morris v. Clawson Tank Co., 459 Mich. 256, 587 N.W.2d 253, 258 n. 5 (1998) (trier of fact must determine whether the plaintiff refused to accept employment of a “like nature” and can consider “the type of work, the hours worked, the compensation, the job security, working conditions, and other conditions of employment” in making the determination).
Moreover, while the majority is correct that there is a possibility of prejudice in admitting evidence of a settlement offer made shortly before trial, the majority’s analysis fails to consider the factors ameliorating this potential prejudice. In his closing, Plaintiff addressed the settlement evidence only in the context.of damages, and the district court gave a limiting instruction, stating that the evidence was “received for, and is only to be considered, for the limited purpose of [the jury’s] deciding whether plaintiff failed to mitigate his damages, and is not to be considered by [the jury] in making a determination as to whether the defendants discriminated against the plaintiff on the basis of age.” J.A. at 558. This factor is relevant to the proper weight of the potential prejudice in the Rule 403 balance. Fed.R.Evid. 403, advisory committee’s note (1972 proposed rule).
WThen truly considering the evidence with the maximum reasonable view of the probative value and the minimum reasonable view of the potential prejudice — rather than ignoring sources of probative value and factors that decrease the potential prejudice — it cannot be said that the dis*811trict court abused its “broad discretion,” even if other jurists would have reached a different outcome if faced with the issue de novo. Accordingly, the evidence was not inadmissible under Rule 403.
III.
The evidence adduced at trial was certainly sufficient for the jury to find in Plaintiffs favor. A plaintiff can succeed on a claim for age discrimination by presenting circumstantial evidence of age discrimination under the familiar burden-shifting model outlined in McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 93 S.Ct. 1817, 36 L.Ed.2d 668 (1973). Coomer v. Bethesda Hosp., Inc., 370 F.3d 499, 510 (6th Cir.2004). In order to establish a prima facie case, a plaintiff must prove that: “(1) he was at least 40 years old at the time of the alleged discrimination; (2) he was subjected to an adverse employment action; (3) he was otherwise qualified for the position; and (4) after he was rejected, a substantially younger applicant was selected.” Id. at 511 (citing Burzynski v. Cohen, 264 F.3d 611, 622 (6th Cir.2001)); Browning v. Dep’t of Army, 436 F.3d 692, 695 (6th Cir.2006).
Here, Plaintiff presented evidence at trial that established all the elements of the prima facie case. Plaintiff .was seventy-three years old at the time of his termination; he was terminated; he was qualified to practice dentistry; and he was replaced by Dr. Bui, who was thirty-three years old. Because Plaintiff established a prima facie case, the burden shifted to Defendants to proffer a legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason. Defendants’ legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason was that Plaintiff was fired because of his low productivity. Under the McDonnell Douglas framework, after a defendant produces a legitimate nondiscriminatory reason for a plaintiffs discharge, the burden shifts back to the plaintiff to show that the defendant’s proffered reason was a pretext for discrimination. Browning, 436 F.3d at 695.
The plaintiff can make this showing by demonstrating that the defendant’s proffered reason “(1) has no basis in fact, (2) did not actually motivate the defendant’s challenged conduct, or (3) was insufficient to warrant the challenged conduct.” See Wexler v. White’s Fine Furniture, 317 F.3d 564, 576 (6th Cir.2003) (en banc) (quoting Dews v. A.B. Dick Co., 231 F.3d 1016, 1021 (6th Cir.2000)). “The first type of showing is easily recognizable and consists of evidence that the proffered bases for the plaintiffs discharge never happened, i.e., that they are ‘factually false.’ The third showing is also easily recognizable and, ordinarily, consists of evidence that other employees, particularly employees not in the protected class, were not fired even though they engaged in substantially identical conduct to that which the employer contends motivated its discharge of the plaintiff.” Manzer v. Diamond Shamrock Chems. Co., 29 F.3d 1078, 1084 (6th Cir.1994) (citation omitted). Under the second showing, “the plaintiff attempts to indict the credibility of his employer’s explanation by showing circumstances which tend to prove that an illegal motivation was more likely than that offered by the defendant. In other words, the plaintiff argues that the sheer weight of the circumstantial evidence of discrimination makes it ‘more likely than not’ that the employer’s explanation is a pretext, or coverup.” Id.
Viewed in the light most favorable to Plaintiff, a reasonable jury could have found that, to the extent that Plaintiff was less productive than Defendants’ other dentists, his lower productivity did not motivate Defendants’ decision to terminate him. First, Plaintiff adduced evidence *812from which a jury could conclude that Defendants’ purported legitimate reason was an after-the-fact concoction. Plaintiff testified that he was never informed that his productivity was a problem. Plaintiff also put forth evidence suggesting that negative comments regarding his productivity were only added to his personnel file after Defendants made the decision to terminate him.
Second, Plaintiff submitted evidence that tended to prove that Defendants hampered his productivity by not providing Plaintiff with his fair share of dental resources. Plaintiff presented evidence that he was not given a second operatory to work out of, and that, after his full-time assistant left in October of 2000, Plaintiff was not given an experienced and dedicated assistant to replace her. And, importantly, Plaintiff presented evidence that the new patients needing expensive procedures were channeled away from him and to the other dentists. Plaintiff proved this point through the testimony of Theresa LeClerc, who worked at the front desk of the dental office, who testified that she was given a directive to steer new patients to other new dentists, but was never given that directive with respect to Plaintiff when he was the newest dentist. Plaintiff also proved this point by the expert testimony of Dr. Unsworth. Dr. Unsworth testified that, because a higher percentage of new patients had not been receiving dental care in the past (as opposed to returning patients, who, by definition, were receiving dental care in the past), new patients as a group tended to require more expensive procedures than returning patients.3 Dr. Unsworth then compared the total number of patient visits (including new and returning patients), expressed as a percentage by dentist, to the total number of expensive procedures, again expressed as a percentage by dentist. The idea is that, if a dentist was assigned more than his pro rata share of new patients, (and the evidence showed that it was Defendants’ policy to assign new patients to the newest dentist), then that fact would be reflected by that dentist having a share of expensive procedures that exceeded his share of total patient visits. This is because the number of new patients that made up that dentist’s share of total patient visits would be greater, and hence the percentage of expensive procedures would be greater. The evidence suggested that Plaintiff was not being allocated a greater-than-pro-rata share of new patients. For example, in 2000, when Plaintiff was the newest dentist, Plaintiff had 21 % of patient visits, but only 16% of the expensive procedures. Dr. Unsworth testified that had Plaintiff been assigned the new patients, Plaintiffs percentage share of expensive procedures would have been in the range of 40% to 50% of the expensive procedures.
Third, Plaintiff produced evidence of remarks made by Defendant Leonor that, while not direct evidence of discrimination,4 suggested that Defendant Leonor *813was highly conscious of Plaintiffs age. On at least three and possibly more occasions, Defendant Leoner told Plaintiff that he was “the oldest dentist that [Defendants] have ever had at Oakcrest.” J.A. at 296. Defendant Leonor also testified that, in the context of terminating Plaintiff, he asked Plaintiffs wife about Plaintiffs plans to retire-which could allow a factfinder to infer that Defendant Leonor thought that, because of Plaintiffs age, it was time for Plaintiff to discontinue his employment.
This non-exhaustive summary of the evidence presented by Plaintiff at trial demonstrates that Plaintiff presented a cohesive, plausible story for his termination: Defendants did not want to invest in growing Plaintiffs practice because of his age, so instead they deprived him of resources and then terminated him to make way for a dentist who Defendants believed, because of his age, would make better business sense over the long-term. Were this in fact what happened — and a jury could easily find that it did — Defendants would have violated the ADEA.
When reviewing the trial court’s denial of a new trial, this Court is not “free to reweigh the evidence and set aside the jury verdict merely because the jury could have drawn different inferences or conclusions or because judges feel that other results are more reasonable.” Barnes v. Owens-Corning Fiberglas Corp., 201 F.3d 815, 821 (6th Cir.2000) (quoting Duncan v. Duncan, 377 F.2d 49, 52 (6th Cir.1967)). Instead, the jury’s verdict must be upheld if it could reasonably be reached by a reasonable jury. Duncan, 377 F.2d at 52. The majority, instead of considering the facts in the light most favorable to Plaintiff, draws inferences for the benefit of Defendants at every turn. Despite Plaintiffs testimony that his performance was hampered by not having a full-time assistant after October of 2000, the majority concludes that “the assistants Dr. Stockman did have were dedicated to him at all times.” Majority Op. at 803. This is inconsistent with Plaintiffs testimony that he did not have a dedicated and experienced assistant. Dedicated and experienced assistants are important to maintaining productivity, because they can anticipate the dentist’s needs, thereby speeding up the dentist’s work. Plaintiff testified that the assistants that were provided to him were inexperienced, and did not remain with him for long periods of time. Plaintiff also testified that Defendants were responsible for hiring his assistants, and that he had no part in the hiring process.
The majority next attempts to discredit Plaintiffs evidence that his restriction to one operatory impeded his productivity. The majority claims that Plaintiff was not allowed to book two operatories because he was slow, and that “Dr. Mac[unovich] ... testified that he typically operated out of one operatory and used the spillover rooms only occasionally.” Majority Op. at 803. The majority, again ignoring the record and inappropriately viewing the facts in the light most favorable to Defendants, avers that “there was no contrary evidence.” Majority Op. at 803. This overlooks Plaintiffs testimony that Dr. Bailey and Dr. Macunovich each “had two [opera-tories] apiece, two apiece, and I had one.” J.A. at 290. A jury could have chosen to credit Plaintiffs evidence that Dr. Macuno-vich had two operatories, and disbelieved Dr. Macunovich’s testimony that he typically operated out of one. Moreover, in light of Plaintiffs evidence that Defendants’ claim that Plaintiff worked slower was a pretext, a jury could believe that Plaintiff was not allowed to double-book operatories because of discrimination, rather than because he was slow.
The majority next asserts that, even if Defendants did dedicate fewer resources *814to Plaintiff, “this does not prove intentional age discrimination and does not rebut the proffered justification that [Plaintiffs] low revenue per patient-hour militated against dedicating further operatories or assistants.” Majority Op. at 803. This statement demonstrates an utter failure to understand Plaintiffs claim: Plaintiff claims that, to the extent that his revenue per patient-hour was low, it was because Defendants were not devoting resources to him. A jury could have credited this explanation.
Finally, the majority’s statement that Plaintiff had “no evidence or even a theory as to how the ‘good patients’ were diverted away from him” is patently false. Majority Op. at 803. The majority admits that there was a policy in place to give new patients to the new dentists. Yet it ignores LeClerc’s testimony that, despite the fact that she was instructed to steer new patients to other new dentists, she was never instructed to direct new patients to Plaintiff. More troubling, the majority appears to misunderstand the evidence presented by Dr. Unsworth. The majority states that “it should not be surprising that in 2000 ... Dr. Stockman saw 21 per cent of the new patients and 16 per cent of the expensive procedures ...; in 2001 it was 20.6 per cent and 20.7 per cent, respectively; and in 2002 it was 16.2 per cent and 16 per cent, respectively.” Majority Op. at 804 (emphasis added). Although Dr. Unsworth did state that Plaintiff saw “21 percent of the new patients,” J.A. at 516 (emphasis added), clearly Dr. Uns-worth merely made an error in speaking. He later stated that the numbers he was referring to were “the total number of patient visits,” and reading his testimony as a whole, it is clear that Dr. Unsworth was never laboring under a misunderstanding as to this point.5 As the newest dentist, Plaintiff was supposed to be allocated more than his pro rata share of new patients — the fact that his percentage of expensive procedures is approximately equal to or less than his percentage of total patient visits is strong evidence that this did not occur, given the unchallenged assertion that new patients, as a group, more frequently tended to require more expensive procedures. Dr. Unsworth testified that, if Plaintiff were truly getting the new patients, he should have had 40% to 50% of the expensive procedures.6 The majority simply disregards this testimony.
When the evidence is considered in the light most favorable to Plaintiff, it is clear that a reasonable jury could find in Plaintiffs favor. Contrary to the majority’s contention, substantial evidence supports the jury’s verdict.
IV.
Because this case represents the unusual situation in which evidence of a settlement agreement was properly admitted, and there was substantial evidence supporting the jury verdict, I would uphold *815the judgment below. Accordingly, I respectfully dissent.

. Plaintiff also sought relief under Michigan’s Elliot-Larson Civil Rights Act, Mich. Comp. Law § 37.2101 et. seq. Section 37.2202 makes it unlawful for an "employer ... [to] discharge ... an individual ... because of ... age.” For the sake of simplicity, the discussion in this dissent focuses on federal law.

. The Pierce court also rejected the defendant's contention that a defendant should always be able to introduce his own settlement offer. The court reasoned that, were a party allowed to introduce his offers, this rule could “bring with it a rash of motions for disqualification of a party’s chosen counsel who would likely become a witness at trial.” Id. at 828. An attorney cannot try a case and testify as a witness because testimony from the offeror would often require rebuttal testimony from the offeree. The offeror could force the offer-ee to face the choice of allowing the offeror's testimony to go unrebutted or forcing the offeree to forgo counsel of his choice. Id. The advisory committee has explicitly affirmed Pierce’s rationale to the extent that it forbids an offeror from presenting his own offer. Fed.R.Evid. 408 advisory committee’s note (2006 amendment).

. These patients, for example, may not have engaged in preventative care, or may have been induced to come to the dentist by the onset of a specific ailment.

. Direct evidence is "evidence which, if believed, requires the conclusion that [age discrimination] was at least a motivating factor in the employer's actions.” See Jacldyn v. Schering-Plough Healthcare Prods. Sales Corp., 176 F.3d 921, 926 (6th Cir.1999). Plaintiff's evidence does not constitute direct evidence because it requires, at the minimum, the inference that Defendants’ concerns about Plaintiff’s age were a motivating factor in Defendants' decision to terminate Plaintiff. The evidence nonetheless constitutes probative circumstantial evidence tending to show that Defendants’ purported legitimate reason for Plaintiff's termination was pretextual.

. As the majority realizes, the documents to which Dr. Unsworth referred discussed the total number of patient visits. Majority Op. at 804.

. The point is simply that if Plaintiff were assigned the new patients he was supposed to receive, and if new patients more frequently needed expensive procedures, then Plaintiff’s percentage share of expensive procedures should exceed his percentage share of total patient visits. Dr. Unsworth testified that this would mean that Plaintiff should have had about a 40% share of the expensive procedures, to go with his 20% share of total patient visits. The fact that Plaintiff did not supports the conclusion that Plaintiff was not in fact allocated the new patients; or if he was, he was only allocated the "table scraps.” See Majority Op. at 804.