Court Opinion

ID: 9495767
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 16:09:51.399677+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:57:11.211078
License: Public Domain

SOTOMAYOR, J.,
concurring in the result.
The majority, consistent with the district court’s approach, affirms the grant of summary judgment on plaintiffs direct negligence and intentional infliction of emotional distress claims on the grounds that harassment of plaintiff by Militano was not within the scope of employment and that no reasonable jury could find Metro-North negligent because Metro-North did not have notice of Militano’s propensity to harass employees. I disagree. I would affirm, however, on the grounds that plaintiffs emotional injuries, and consequent physical manifestations, are not compensa-ble under FELA because they fail to satisfy the “zone of danger” test developed in Consolidated Rail Corp. v. Gottshall, 512 U.S. 532, 114 S.Ct. 2396, 129 L.Ed.2d 427 (1994).
The majority concludes that “Higgins provides no evidence that Metro-North was aware that Militano was prone to sexually harass his co-workers prior to the *429alleged unwanted physical contacts and all but one of the alleged sexually-charged comments.” But this is not a Title VII sexual harassment case, nor is the underlying tort based on sexual harassment.1 Instead, plaintiffs claim is that she was repeatedly yelled at by Militano and touched inappropriately by him, and that this conduct in its entirety either amounted to intentional infliction of emotional distress or caused her harm for which Metro-North is liable because its negligent supervision of Militano permitted the harassment to occur. Although an employer’s knowledge may be probative evidence in an negligent supervision claim, I find the majority’s sole focus on whether Metro-North was aware of any propensity of Militano to harass his co-workers sexually to be inappropriate.
The majority notes that Yaeger, a supervisor, admitted knowing that Militano had been accused of inappropriate physical contact with two other employees, Carl Walz and Les Erwin. While Yaeger was never able to determine whether or not the physical contact with Erwin had occurred, he admitted that he “did not counsel [Mili-tano] in a corrective fashion or from a disciplinary standpoint.” Yaeger also agreed when asked that “there [were] times when John Militano has had difficulty in controlling his anger in the shop,” and further stated that he had spoken to Militano on several occasions about “better handling [his] subordinates or better handling how to speak to people.” Indeed, the majority recognizes that “Metro-North certainly knew that Militano had difficulty controlling his temper.” Given this evidence and the nature of plaintiffs claim, a reasonable jury could conclude that Metro-North knew or should have known that Militano had a propensity to act abusively toward employees.
Furthermore, while I do not disagree with the majority’s conclusion that “[except for the poking incident that Yaeger observed and inquired about, Higgins did not report these incidents of physical contact to anyone at the time they occurred,” taken together, there is evidence in the record suggesting that Metro-North may have been aware of several of the incidents involving Militano’s alleged abuse of plaintiff well before her formal complaint in May 1998, and failed to take any action to prevent the situation from escalating.
Drawing all inferences in the light most favorable to plaintiff, the non-moving party, the record contains the following evidence. Plaintiff testified that in 1996, her supervisor, William Duke, witnessed an incident in which Militano was “screaming his head off [at plaintiff] and Billy [Duke] just couldn’t believe it.” After plaintiff told Militano not to yell at her, Militano “started laughing and saying you’re such an easy target. I was only kidding.” Plaintiff claims she was very upset. It is also undisputed that Yaeger witnessed an incident involving Militano poking plaintiff in November 1997, asked plaintiff if she liked his conduct, and allegedly promised to put an end to Militano’s conduct after plaintiff told him “No. But I can’t get him to stop.” While Yaeger did talk to Milita-no about the incident, plaintiff testified that in March 1998, after the poking incident, Militano put his arms around plaintiffs waist while she was kneeling in front of a file cabinet, startling her, and also “slapped [her] fanny at the ... fax machine.” Finally, when plaintiff returned to work in August 1998, after formally reporting the harassment in May 1998, she *430claims that Militano told her she had a “great ass,” repeatedly called the train-master’s office where she was working, and circled around the parking lot as she was leaving on two occasions, leading her to feel that she was being stalked. Indeed, plaintiffs supervisor at that time, Edward Byrne, noted an increase in the number of calls Militano made to the office after she began working there and stated that Militano visited the office a number of times; Byrne could not “recall ever seeing [Militano] in our office prior to [plaintiff] coming in.” Byrne further stated in his deposition that after plaintiff left, Militano largely stopped visiting the office.
Accordingly, plaintiff alleges that Metro-North was aware that Militano had a propensity to harass employees verbally and physically, that she suffered both types of harassment at his hands, and that she was injured by this conduct. We have repeatedly held that “an employer breaches its duty under FELA ‘if it knew or should have known of a potential hazard in the workplace, and yet failed to exercise reasonable care to inform and protect its employees.’ ” Williams v. Long Island R.R. Co., 196 F.3d 402, 406 (2d Cir.1999) (quoting Ulfik v. Metro-North Commuter R.R., 77 F.3d 54, 58 (2d Cir.1996)); accord Syverson v. Consol. Rail Corp., 19 F.3d 824, 826 (2d Cir.1994). “Reasonable care is determined in light of whether or not a particular danger was foreseeable.” Syverson, 19 F.3d at 826. “The test is ‘whether the proofs justify with reason the conclusion that employer negligence played any part, even the slightest, in producing the injury.’ ” Williams, 196 F.3d at 406-07 (quoting Ulfik, 77 F.3d at 58).2 While this is a somewhat close case, “a relaxed standard of negligence applies in FELA cases in this Circuit,” id. at 406, and a reasonable jury could conclude from this record that Metro-North was aware of a particular threat posed by Militano to plaintiff and thus that there was a basis for imputing liability to Metro-North. Cf. Gadsden v. Port Auth. Trans-Hudson Corp., 140 F.3d 207, 209 (2d Cir.1998) (“Under the FELA, ‘the case must not be dismissed at the summary judgment phase unless there is absolutely no reasonable basis for a jury to find for the plaintiff.’ ” (quoting Syverson, 19 F.3d at 828)).
I concur in the result affirming the grant of summary judgment, however, on the ground that plaintiff has failed to satisfy the requirements of the “zone of danger” test articulated in Gottshall, 512 U.S. at 547-48, 114 S.Ct. 2396, which I conclude applies to all of plaintiffs negligence and intent-based claims, because they are all claims for recovery based on mental or emotional harm.3
In Gottshall, the Supreme Court addressed “the proper standard for evaluating claims for negligent infliction of emotional distress that are brought under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act.” Id. at 535, 114 S.Ct. 2396. Although the claims at issue in Gottshall were negligent infliction of emotional distress claims, the Court went on broadly to discuss the claim in terms of the types of injuries that are compensable under FELA: “The injury *431we deal with here is mental or emotional harm (such as fright or anxiety) that is caused by the negligence of another and that is not directly brought about by a physical injury, but that may manifest itself in physical symptoms.” Id. at 544, 114 S.Ct. 2396; see also id. at 542, 114 S.Ct. 2396 (“Our task today is determining under what circumstances emotional distress may constitute ‘injury’ resulting from ‘negligence’ for purposes of [FELA].”). The Court held, in light of the common law and “FELA’s central focus on physical perils,” id. at 555, 114 S.Ct. 2396, that
allowing recovery for negligently inflicted emotional injury as provided for under the zone of danger test best harmonizes these considerations. Under this test, a worker within the zone of danger of physical impact will be able to recover for emotional injury caused by fear of physical injury to himself, whereas a worker outside the zone will not. Railroad employees thus will be able to recover for injuries — physical and emotional — caused by the negligent conduct of their employers that threatens them imminently with physical impact.
Id. at 556, 114 S.Ct. 2396 (emphasis added).
Several years later, the Supreme Court considered the issue of the scope of the zone of danger test under FELA in Metro-North Commuter Railroad Co. v. Buckley, 521 U.S. 424, 117 S.Ct. 2113, 138 L.Ed.2d 560 (1997), holding that “a railroad worker negligently exposed to a carcinogen ... but without symptoms of any disease” cannot recover for negligently in-flieted emotional distress under FELA “unless, and until, he manifests symptoms of a disease.” Id. at 426-27, 117 S.Ct. 2113. In so holding, the Court observed that “the words ‘physical impact’ do not encompass every form of ‘physical contact.’ ” Id. at 432, 117 S.Ct. 2113. The Court also noted that the common law permitted recovery for emotional distress that resulted from a physical injury or disease, and concluded that allowing recovery where there was some physical contact — there, exposure to asbestos — but no claim that the contact had caused any physical damage yet, would expose employers to too great a risk of unlimited and unpredictable liability. Id. at 431-37, 117 S.Ct. 2113.
It is with these decisions in mind that I approach plaintiffs claims. I would hold that the zone of danger test applies to plaintiffs intentional infliction of emotional distress claim, and, given the lack of any claim of physical injury resulting from Mil-itano’s touching of plaintiff and plaintiffs unambiguous testimony that she never feared for her physical safety, would find that her claim fails.4 While plaintiff contends that the common law tort of intentional infliction of emotional distress, which is variously characterized as “outrageous” or “extreme,” is sufficiently rigorous to guarantee the authenticity of her emotional distress allegations, this approach takes the focus away from the core concern of FELA as described in both Gottshall and Buckley: that employees must suffer some kind of physical harm, impact, or invasion *432before they may recover under the Act.5 Cf. Gottshall, 512 U.S. at 556-57, 114 S.Ct. 2396 (rejecting the common law “relative bystander” test in part on the grounds that “we discern from FELA and its emphasis on protecting employees from physical harms no basis to extend recovery to bystanders outside the zone of danger”).
Turning to plaintiffs two direct negligence claims, I agree with the Tenth Circuit that “the substance of [a plaintiffs] injury is the focus of our inquiry in determining whether the zone of danger test applies.” Smith v. Union Pac. R.R., 236 F.3d 1168, 1171 (10th Cir.2000). As the Tenth Circuit noted in Smith, “[a] close reading of [Gottshall ] reveals that the Court focused on whether emotional injuries were compensable under FELA, rather than upon the specific cause of action.” Id. (emphasis added) (citing Gottshall, 512 U.S. at 541, 544, 545-46, 114 S.Ct. 2396).
Thus, while the claim in Smith was that the railroad had been negligent in requiring the plaintiff to work a rotating shift that resulted in a sleep disorder and severe depression, ultimately leading to an exacerbation in the plaintiffs spinal injury, id. at 1170, and plaintiffs claims in the instant case are that the railroad negligently supervised Militano and faded to create a safe workplace, I do not see this distinction as material. Instead, if “we look to the substance of [plaintiffs] injury and the nature of [Metro-North’s] conduct to determine whether [plaintiff] must satisfy the [zone of danger] test,” id. at 1171, I find that plaintiff has alleged that she suffered stress caused by Militano and that the railroad’s negligent conduct ultimately triggered her Multiple Sclerosis. In short, it is the nature of the injury claimed, rather than the characterization of the tort, that is dispositive in my view.
Accordingly, I would hold that the zone of danger test applies to all plaintiffs claims, and conclude that her claims fail because she was not within that zone of danger in light of her testimony that she never suffered or feared any physical harm from Militano.

. Although the district court also approached plaintiffs claims through the lens of sexual harassment, the allegations of her complaint make clear that her complaints about Milita-no are not limited to sexual harassment.

. Similarly, under the common law tort of negligent supervision, an employer may be liable for negligent supervision if an employee suffers an injury that "was a reasonably foreseeable consequence of the [employer’s] conduct.” Richichi v. Constr. Mgmt. Techs., Inc., 244 A.D.2d 540, 664 N.Y.S.2d 615, 617 (2d Dep't 1997).

. "[U]nlike the question of whether there is negligence or not, the inquiry into the weightiness of the physical risk to which a plaintiff is exposed, would, even in FELA cases, be performed by courts and not primarily by juries.” Nelson v. Metro-North Commuter R.R., 235 F.3d 101, 113 n. 12 (2d Cir.2000).

. Plaintiff does allege that Militano touched her on several occasions. We have recognized, however, that “Buckley has restated the traditional rule that an event cannot constitute a physical impact, even if it entails contact, unless it has a physically harmful effect on the body.” Nelson v. Metro-North Commuter R.R., 235 F.3d 101, 110 (2d Cir.2000). Plaintiff claims that she was angered and upset by the "whole situation" with Militano and that this distress eventually led to an onset of Multiple Sclerosis. There is no claim or evidence that the touching alone had any physically harmful effect; indeed, plaintiff testified that she suffered no physical injury from Militano's contact.

. While I recognize that this may preclude recovery for purely emotional harm even where the conduct alleged is extreme and outrageous, this is not a sufficient basis in my view to conclude that the zone of danger test does not apply. The Supreme Court emphasized in Gottshall that while FELA was passed for humanitarian purposes, "[t]hat FELA is to be liberally construed ... does not mean that it is a workers’ compensation statute. We have insisted that FELA 'does not make the employer the insurer of the safety of his employees while they are on duty. The basis of his liability is his negligence, not the fact that injuries occur.’ ” Gottshall, 512 U.S. at 543, 114 S.Ct. 2396 (quoting Ellis v. Union Pac. R.R., 329 U.S. 649, 653, 67 S.Ct. 598, 91 L.Ed. 572 (1947)).