Court Opinion

ID: 9497534
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 16:53:32.233768+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:58:15.134184
License: Public Domain

ROGERS, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
Because in my view the district court properly granted summary judgment on the procedural due process claim, I respectfully dissent from Part III.A. of the majority opinion. “Due process is a flexible principle whose requirements depend on the facts of the individual case.” Leary v. Daeschner, 228 F.3d 729, 743 (6th Cir.2000). Due process does not require that all bases for a final decision to terminate be part of an initial decision to suspend. Once an employee has been suspended without a due process violation, his property interest is lessened. His interest is not in staying employed, but in returning to work. “Termination” in this context is merely a formal date, as the employee is working neither before nor after that date. In such a context a “post-termination” hearing may well be sufficient to satisfy the requirements of due process. See Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U.S. 319, 339-43, 96 S.Ct. 893, 47 L.Ed.2d 18 (1976); cf. Collyer v. Darling, 98 F.3d 211, 223-24 (6th Cir.1996). Indeed, it appears to be sufficient in this case. The suspension letter given to Singfield not only informs Singfield that he was being suspended for the unauthorized duplication of master keys and altercation with Reinhart, but also informs him that the Housing Authority had concerns regarding “several [other] altercations between you and your supervisors, as well as with fellow employees.” Singfield thus was “faced with charges that a reasonable person would recognize as jeopardizing an employment future.” Buckner v. City of Highland Park, 901 F.2d 491, 495-96 (6th Cir.1990). The process Singfield received therefore satisfies the flexible requirements of procedural due process.
At the very least, qualified immunity is warranted for Mr. Reinhart on the due process issue. Even if due process should extend to requiring that validly suspended employees get the same “pre-termination” hearing that working employees get, there has been no demonstration that such a requirement is “clearly established.” See Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982).