Court Opinion

ID: 9943405
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-02-23 16:00:41.940213+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:46:58.377448
License: Public Domain

22-914
     Moses v. St. Vincent’s Special Needs Ctr.

                             UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                                 FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT

                                           SUMMARY ORDER
RULINGS BY SUMMARY ORDER DO NOT HAVE PRECEDENTIAL EFFECT. CITATION TO A SUMMARY
ORDER FILED ON OR AFTER JANUARY 1, 2007, IS PERMITTED AND IS GOVERNED BY FEDERAL RULE OF
APPELLATE PROCEDURE 32.1 AND THIS COURT’S LOCAL RULE 32.1.1. WHEN CITING A SUMMARY
ORDER IN A DOCUMENT FILED WITH THIS COURT, A PARTY MUST CITE EITHER THE FEDERAL
APPENDIX OR AN ELECTRONIC DATABASE (WITH THE NOTATION “SUMMARY ORDER”). A PARTY
CITING TO A SUMMARY ORDER MUST SERVE A COPY OF IT ON ANY PARTY NOT REPRESENTED BY
COUNSEL.

 1              At a stated term of the United States Court of Appeals for the
 2   Second Circuit, held at the Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse, 40
 3   Foley Square, in the City of New York, on the 23rd day of February, two thousand
 4   twenty-four.
 5
 6   PRESENT:
 7              JOHN M. WALKER, JR.,
 8              SUSAN L. CARNEY,
 9              MICHAEL H. PARK,
10                    Circuit Judges.
11   _____________________________________
12
13   James E. Moses, Jr.,
14
15                                Plaintiff-Appellant,
16
17                      v.                                        22-914
18
19   St. Vincent’s Special Needs Center,
20
21                    Defendant-Appellee.
22   _____________________________________
1    FOR PLAINTIFF-APPELLANT:                                     James E. Moses, Jr., pro
2                                                                 se, Bridgeport, CT.
3
4    FOR DEFENDANT-APPELLEE:                                      Sarah R. Skubas, Jessica
5                                                                 L. Draper, Jackson Lewis
6                                                                 P.C., Hartford, CT.
7

8          Appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the District

 9   of Connecticut (Underhill, J.).

10         UPON      DUE     CONSIDERATION,             IT   IS   HEREBY       ORDERED,

11   ADJUDGED, AND DECREED that the judgment of the district court is

12   AFFIRMED.

13         Appellant James E. Moses, Jr., proceeding pro se, appeals the district court’s

14   partial grant of summary judgment in favor of St. Vincent’s Special Needs Center,

15   his former employer, on his Title VII gender-discrimination claim and state-law

16   defamation claim, and an adverse judgment entered after a two-day bench trial on

17   his remaining Title VII retaliation claim. See Moses v. St. Vincent’s Special Needs

18   Ctr., No. 3:17-cv-1936 (SRU), 2022 WL 972439 (D. Conn. Mar. 31, 2022); Moses v. St.

19   Vincent’s Special Needs Ctr., Inc., No. 3:17-cv-1936 (SRU), 2021 WL 1123851 (D.

20   Conn. Mar. 24, 2021). We assume the parties’ familiarity with the underlying

21   facts, procedural history, and issues on appeal.
1          On appeal, Moses largely fails to address the grounds on which the district

2    court ruled.    Instead, he contends for the first time that the district court’s

3    decisions violated his First Amendment right to free speech. We thus deem most

4    of Moses’s challenges abandoned and do not consider the new issues he raises for

5    the first time on appeal. See Terry v. Inc. Vill. of Patchogue, 826 F.3d 631, 632-33 (2d

6    Cir. 2016) (“Although we accord filings from pro se litigants a high degree of

7    solicitude, even a litigant representing himself is obliged to set out ‘identifiable

8    arguments’ in his principal brief.” (citation omitted)); Cruz v. Gomez, 202 F.3d 593,

 9   596 n.3 (2d Cir. 2000) (“When a litigant—including a pro se litigant—raises an issue

10   before the district court but does not raise it on appeal, the issue is abandoned.”);

11   Baldwin v. U.S. Army, 223 F.3d 100, 102 (2d Cir. 2000) (“It is well-established that

12   an appellate court will not generally consider an issue raised for the first time on

13   appeal.”).

14         Moses’s only preserved arguments are that the court erred by (1) not

15   admitting the full audio recording of St. Vincent’s Program Director Jezierny’s

16   testimony before the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and

17   Opportunities (“CHRO”), which Moses claims would have shown that Jezierny
 1   “intentionally and maliciously” made contradicting statements, and (2) ignoring

 2   his trial exhibits B1 and C.

 3         These arguments are unavailing. First, the district court did allow Moses

 4   to introduce the part of a recording of Jezierny’s CHRO testimony that showed

 5   Jezierny had contradicted herself.        The court nevertheless found credible

 6   Jezierny’s testimony at trial that the decision to terminate Moses was made two

 7   days before he complained about discrimination to his supervisor Frances

 8   Hernandez.     In any event, we do not “second-guess the bench-trial court’s

 9   credibility assessments.” Krist v. Kolombos Rest. Inc., 688 F.3d 89, 95 (2d Cir. 2012).

10   Moses does not explain how the full recording would have revealed new

11   information or changed the district court’s decision.

12         Second, Exhibit B1—a verification affidavit signed by Hernandez—fails to

13   provide any evidence relevant to the district court’s decision. Moreover, Exhibit

14   C—Hernandez’s notes from September 5 and 7—is consistent with Jezierny’s

15   testimony that Moses was not informed about the decision to terminate him until

16   September 7, and was in fact addressed throughout the district court’s decision.

17
1        We have considered all of Moses’s remaining arguments and find them to

2   be without merit. Accordingly, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court.

3
4                                      FOR THE COURT:
5                                      Catherine O’Hagan Wolfe, Clerk of Court