Court Opinion

ID: 9863154
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-25 03:08:18.658382+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:47:44.690182
License: Public Domain

Justice RIVERA-SOTO,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I concur with the following three conclusions of law reached by the majority: that “the payment of wages on a discriminatory basis proscribed by the LAD is, and remains, an actionable violation of our state’s anti-discrimination law as long as the wage remains tainted by the original discriminatory aetion[,]” ante at 235, 8 A.3d at 207; that “[e]ach payment of such discriminatory wages thus constitutes a renewed separable and actionable wrong that is remediable under the LAD[,]” ante at 235, 8 A.3d at 207; and that “[t]he two-year statute of limitations applies to such violations, cutting off the untimely portion and, as a result, operating as a limit on the back period for which a plaintiff may seek recovery under the LAD[,]” ante at 235, 8 A.3d at 207. All things being equal, those conclusions seemingly should lead to the majority’s final conclusion: that “plaintiffs’ complaint was timely in respect of the allegedly discriminatory wages paid during the two years immediately prior to the filing of their complaint[,]” and that, to that extent, plaintiffs’ complaint should be reinstated. *237Ante at 235-36, 8 A.3d at 207. However, all things are not equal; the unique facts of this case and the volitional and intentional choices made by plaintiffs command a far different outcome. As a result, I must part company with the majority in respect of its final conclusion.
As the factual summary described by the majority makes clear, on July 27, 2007, three plaintiffs filed a complaint against defendants alleging that each plaintiff had been the subject of discrimination in respect of their pay dating from their original dates of employment; they sought damages that stretched back 29, 25 and 20 years, respectively. Ruling on defendants’ motion to dismiss that asserted that plaintiffs’ complaint was barred by the statute of limitations, the trial court determined that plaintiffs’ damages claims based on pay decisions or their impact older than two years before the filing of their lawsuit indeed were barred by the statute of limitations. Plaintiffs sought reconsideration, which was denied. Plaintiffs then knowingly and intentionally made a strategic and dispositive decision: adopting an “all-or-nothing” stance, plaintiffs moved before the trial court for a ruling that the continuing violations doctrine applied to their discrimination claims and, hence, they were entitled to wage differential damages well past the two-year statute of limitations period, instead going back between two and three decades. That application, too, was rejected.
Abandoning all other avenues of attack before both the Appellate Division and this Court, plaintiffs doggedly have clung to the position—exclusive of all others—that their decades-old discrimination claims remained alive under the continuing violations doctrine. And, despite repeated attempts by this Court during argument to inject some moderation into plaintiffs’ “all-or-nothing” gamble, plaintiffs steadfastly have rejected the remedy the majority today gratuitously awards: the recovery of provable discriminatory pay differential arising during the limitations period immediately preceding the filing of the complaint.
*238It is important to underscore that the majority has rejected soundly plaintiffs’ gambit to extend the continuing violations doctrine to this setting, a rejection in which I concur. Thus, having rejected plaintiffs’ sole and intentionally exclusive ground for appeal, the poignant question remains unanswered: why are plaintiffs entitled to any relief at all?
As a practical matter, the decision reached by the majority reinstates the initial determination made by the trial court in response to defendants’ motion to dismiss. That relief, however, categorically was rejected by plaintiffs. Despite the lukewarm explanation the majority crafts to justify its indulgence towards plaintiffs—that plaintiffs somehow were “influenced by the lower courts’ misconceived insistence on a showing ... of [timely] fresh discriminatory pay actions” and, thus, “should be permitted to reinstate the timely claims that survive the cut-off of the two-year statute of limitations[,]” ante at 236 n. 4, 8 A.3d at 207 n. 4, a claim plaintiffs pointedly never advanced—there is no proper jurisprudential reason to rescue plaintiffs from the consequences of their considered actions.
Having made their election with the advice of competent counsel, there can be no legal or equitable justification to reheve plaintiffs of the direct and proximate results of that election. The better reasoned outcome in this case is to adopt the majority’s reasoning in respect of the timeliness of plaintiffs’ claims—thereby modifying the rationale of the Appellate Division—but nevertheless affirm the judgment dismissing plaintiffs’ complaint. Because the majority wrongfully and without proper warrant extends an unprecedented level of largesse to plaintiff—at the sole expense, to be sure, of defendants who have been denied basic due process by way of notice and an opportunity to be heard in respect of the result this Court unilaterally has conjured up—I dissent.
For reversal and remandment—Chief Justice RABNER, LONG, LaVECCHIA, ALBIN and HOENS—5.
*239For concurrence in part; dissent in part—Justice RIVERA-SOTO—1.
Not Participating—Justice STERN. -