Crosswright v. Escambia Cmty. Clinics

666 F.Supp.3d 1200

Dr. Earl J. CROSSWRIGHT, Plaintiff, v. ESCAMBIA COMMUNITY CLINICS, d/b/a Community Health North West Florida, Defendant.

CASE NO. 3:20cv5963-MCR-HTC

United States District Court, N.D. Florida, Pensacola Division

Signed March 31, 2023

Archibald Hovanesian, Jr., Pensacola, FL, for Plaintiff.

Vickie Allene Gesellschap, Sniffen & Spellman PA, Pensacola, FL, Robert Jacob Sniffen, Sniffen & Spellman PA, Tallahassee, FL, for Defendant.

ORDER

M. CASEY RODGERS, UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

Pending before the Court is Defendant Escambia Community Clinics's Motion for Summary Judgment on all of Plaintiff Dr. Earl J. Crosswright's claims. ECF No. 79. After careful review, the motion will be granted.

Escambia Community Clinics ("ECC") is a community health center located in Pensacola, Florida. ECC is a Florida not-forprofit corporation and is designated as a Federally Qualified Health Center. ECC's Chief Executive Officer is Shandra Smiley, and its Chief Medical Officer is Dr. George Smith.

Dr. Earl Crosswright is a medical doctor who operated his own family medical practice in Pensacola for twenty-four years. In 2017, Crosswright inquired of ECC about selling his practice to ECC. ECC declined to buy the practice but offered Crosswright a position as a family medical physician instead. Crosswright accepted the offer, and the parties entered into a formal employment contract on March 29, 2017. In pertinent part, the employment contract states that Crosswright's principal duty was "to provide professional services to patients of ECC and to perform the normal and customary duties of a [f]amily [p]ractice [p]hysician." ECF No. 78-8 at 1. The contract required Crosswright to meet the following three qualifications to maintain his employment: (1) the physician must have "a valid, unrestricted Florida license to practice medicine;" (2) the physician "must be Board Certified or eligible and receive[ ] Board Certification within two years of [the] state date of employment;" and (3) the physician "[m]ust meet all [ECC] credentialing and privileging criteria." Id. at 7. The Board Certification provision allowed ECC "to shorten or lengthen the time frame and/or the requirement for Board Certification based upon operational needs." Id. Under Section 6 of the contract, Crosswright could be terminated with or without cause. In the event Crosswright was fired for cause, the termination would occur immediately on delivery of written notice, at which point his salary would end. Grounds for a cause termination included, among other things, a failure to perform the duties and obligations within the contract. The contract also provided for termination without cause at any time on ninety (90) days' written notice, and Crosswright would be entitled to his salary during this ninety day period. Id. at 4. Absent termination by either party, the contract automatically renewed each year. Id. at 4.

During Crosswright's employment, Smith was his direct supervisor and administered his performance evaluations. In 2019, Crosswright was given his 2018 performance evaluation, which stated that he failed to meet performance expectations for the number of patients served, failed to meet expectations for patient satisfaction, failed to meet peer-reviewed quality standards, and failed to adequately function as part of the team. Crosswright provided written comments in response, stating that his low performance was attributable to the administration's policies that substantially increased patient wait times and blaming the administration for being retaliative since he had raised concerns about excessive narcotics prescriptions at ECC. ECF No. 42-10. On July 15, 2019, Smiley provided a formal written memo addressed to Crosswright's concerns in which she explained to Crosswright that all physicians are evaluated under the same contractual performance standards. She noted that Crosswright's "team player score" was low due to "issues [they] have discussed throughout the year," which included "reports of staff crying because they were made to feel inadequate" by Crosswright, "repeated complaints from [Crosswright's] co-workers" that led to his some of co-workers choosing to transfer, and comments from employees that Crosswright contributed to "a toxic work environment." ECF No. 42-4. Regarding Crosswright's concerns about narcotics prescription practices at ECC, Smiley reiterated that ECC physicians are responsible for their own DEA licenses but beyond that ECC had implemented best practices for its physicians who prescribe narcotics. Later that year, in September 2019, the administration put Crosswright on a performance improvement plan. The plan identified the following issues: (1) low patient numbers; (2) lack of board certification; (3) inconsistent work hours below the required forty hours per week; (4) violation of the code of conduct through his "words, tone, actions, and behaviors [that] have . . . created an uncomfortable, intimidating and demeaning atmosphere for staff;" (5) conflicts of interest; and (6) "demonstrat[ing] through actions and behaviors a disregard and disrespect for ECC policies and procedures." ECF No. 78-13. The plan provided performance expectations corresponding with each issue and warned that if Crosswright continued to miss these expectations he could be terminated.

As ECC made clear both in Crosswright's employment contract and his performance plan, Crosswright was required to obtain board certification within two years of his employment start date. In fact, ECC required all physicians hired after 2015 to become board certified within two years of their start date. At the beginning of his employment, Crosswright was board eligible but not board certified. Based on the terms of his contract with ECC, he had until March 29, 2019 to become board certified. This deadline passed without Crosswright becoming board certified. On April 3, 2019, ECC granted Crosswright an extension to obtain board certification until December 31, 2019, and warned that if he did not obtain board certification by that date, ECC "will offer no further extensions and will separate you from employment effective January 1, 2020." ECF No. 78-21. This deadline also passed without Crosswright receiving his board certification. In February 2020, Smiley offered Crosswright a physician in residence position at S.S. Dixon Elementary School because the position did not require immediate board certification; however, the offer was conditioned on Crosswright receiving board certification by December 31, 2020. Before Crosswright accepted or rejected the position, the COVID-19 pandemic, which reached the Pensacola area around March 2020, disrupted the physician in residence position at the elementary school. As such, Crosswright continued to work at ECC without board certification during this period and never accepted the elementary school position.

On March 19, 2020, in a meeting with ECC administrators and several other ECC medical staff, Crosswright expressed serious concerns regarding ECC's COVID-19 policies. Specifically, Crosswright objected to what he claims was an ECC policy prohibiting physicians from wearing masks and gloves around patients because it would create too much fear. According to ECC, Crosswright's tone and mannerisms during this meeting were inappropriate and insubordinate. As a result, Smiley directed Crosswright to leave the building and placed him on administrative leave. On April 1, 2020, Smiley sent Crosswright an official termination letter. The letter advised Crosswright that if he obtained future employment as a physician, ECC "will gladly refer" his patients to his new location. ECF No. 78-9. The letter reflects that Crosswright's termination was without cause, meaning his salary was paid through July 1, 2020, which was ninety days from the termination letter. Nonetheless, ECC states in this lawsuit that Crosswright was terminated for poor performance, insubordination, and his failure to obtain board certification.

After terminating Crosswright, ECC sent a letter to the ECC patients who sought medical care from Crosswright during his employment, notifying them that Crosswright was no longer practicing medicine at ECC but that ECC had other qualified physicians who could continue to provide them care. The letter acknowledged that some patients may choose to change their primary care provider and, in that case, ECC would forward their medical records to the new provider on request. ECC also called the patients who received these letters to further communicate this information. The ECC employee who called the patients stated that, if asked, she told patients about Crosswright's new location. Additionally, as part of its normal termination procedure, ECC waited thirty days from the termination date to terminate Crosswright's credentials in order to ensure that all outstanding insurance claims had time to be processed. See ECF No. 42-5. Crosswright claims this procedure made it difficult for him to see patients during this period because insurance companies would not allow him to submit claims under different credentials at his new location without ECC's release.

In September 2020, Crosswright dual-filed a charge of discrimination with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC") and the Florida Commission on Human Relations ("FCHR"), claiming that ECC terminated his employment for retaliatory and discriminatory purposes in violation of state and federal law.¹ See ECF No. 78-18. The EEOC dismissed the charge based on its determination that there was no reasonable cause to believe that a violation of the law had occurred. See ECF No. 78-18 at 2-3. Subsequently, on November 4, 2020, Crosswright filed a civil suit in the Circuit Court of the First Judicial Circuit in and for Escambia County, Florida, raising claims for breach of contract, tortious interference, civil theft and unjust enrichment, restraint of trade, racial...