Deangelis v. City of Bridgeport

CARLA DeANGELIS, Plaintiff, v. CITY OF BRIDGEPORT, et al., Defendants.

No. 3:14-cv-01618 (JAM)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT DISTRICT OF CONNECTICUT

September 5, 2017

RULING ON MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT

Plaintiff Carla DeAngelis worked for the City of Bridgeport as a "telecommunicator" to answer emergency phone calls. She has filed this lawsuit against the City and three of her supervisors at the emergency call center alleging claims for discrimination and retaliation relating to her gender and sexual orientation. She also alleges a wide range of other federal and state law claims based on essentially the same facts. Defendants have now moved for summary judgment. For the reasons stated below, I will grant defendants' motion as to most of plaintiff's claims, but deny it with respect to her claims of gender discrimination, retaliation, and both intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress.

BACKGROUND

The following facts are either not disputed or, where disputed, are presented in the light most favorable to plaintiff as the non-moving party. Between February 2012 and December 2013, Plaintiff worked for defendant City of Bridgeport as a telecommunicator at the City's Public Safety and Communications Center (the "Center"). Plaintiff has filed this lawsuit against the City as well as against individual defendants including Dorie Price, who was director of the Center, Anthony P. D'Onofrio, Jr., who was plaintiff's supervisor, and Debra Deida, who was a training officer at the Center.

As part of her work, plaintiff was required to answer emergency calls and help respond to them, such as by asking the caller for information and assisting in the dispatch of the City's emergency services. Plaintiff was an employee whose peers and supervisors characterized her as knowledgeable, positive, and easy to work with. See, e.g., Doc. #49-7 at 6.

While all parties acknowledge that an emergency call center can be a stressful work environment, plaintiff has adduced evidence going beyond usual workplace stress. Plaintiff and her coworkers attested that D'Onofrio was extremely aggressive toward women subordinates in the office, routinely yelling at them and getting into arguments with them, and then following them around in the office or even outside to continue arguing. Doc. #49-4 at 40-42; Doc. #49-5 at 64-66; Doc. #49-6 at 21. And while D'Onofrio would be confrontational verbally with male employees, he would not physically pursue them through the halls or outside as he did with women. Doc. #49-5 at 64-66.

Women were also treated differently by the supervisors when it came to disciplinary rules like dealing with mistakes made on calls or the enforcement of rules surrounding break times. A woman making an error on a call would be yelled at by a supervisor repeatedly, while a man would be relieved and allowed to take a break. Doc. #49-5 at 60-62. Men would also be put on less strenuous overtime shifts. Id. at 62. And men would be treated more leniently when it came to break time; they would be allowed to leave frequently and be gone for long stretches, while women would be asked who gave them permission for the break and the exact times they began and ended the breaks. Id. at 68-69.

D'Onofrio, who maintained a sign-out system for breaks in which employees signed up for break time in advance on two separate sheets, used the system "to single women out," behaving volatilely toward women and not letting them go to the bathroom, but not botheringmen regarding the sign-out requirement. Doc. #49-4 at 52. D'Onofrio was not the only defendant whom female employees perceived as harassing them with disciplinary write-ups; one coworker claimed that she had experienced being harassed by Price to the point where she didn't want to come to work. Doc. #49-5 at 97.

In addition to this evidence about the working environment in general, plaintiff points to specific incidents that occurred between March and November 2013. In March of 2013, plaintiff was on duty and received a call regarding a head trauma. Doc. #49-4 at 16. D'Onofrio was supervising at that time, but was not wearing his headset that allowed him to listen to the calls as they were coming in. Id. at 18. D'Onofrio believed plaintiff was mismanaging the call, and he walked over to her and began interrupting her and asking her why she was directing the call the way she was. Plaintiff told him she could not talk to him at that moment and continued handling the call. Id. at 20. D'Onofrio yelled at plaintiff, but she ignored him to focus on the call. Id. at 24.

Two weeks after the call, D'Onofrio ordered plaintiff into the supervisor's office. Doc. #49-4 at 25. Apparently in reference to plaintiff's tone when she responded to him during the call, D'Onofrio said "the only time you should answer me like that is when I am grabbing you by the neck and shaking you." Ibid. Plaintiff was shaken by the comment, and she felt physically threatened by D'Onofrio. Ibid.¹

Later in April, plaintiff came to believe that another employee, Tammy Cowette, had made a mistake in how she had arranged the schedule, and asked Cowette to show plaintiff how she had come up with the arrangement. Doc. #49-3 at 13. Cowette declined, and plaintiff said, under her breath, "this is fucking ridiculous." Ibid.; Doc. #49-4 at 67. Cursing was frequent in plaintiff's workplace. Doc. #27-5 at 177. D'Onofrio approached the two of them, and told plaintiff "if you think you have any right to look at this schedule, you're ignorant." Doc. #49-4 at 39. D'Onofrio's manner was aggressive, and he was speaking loud enough for everyone else in the call center to hear; Cowette told him to calm down. Ibid.

The next day, plaintiff went to the cafeteria on a lunch break after she had signed out on one of the break sheets. Doc. #49-4 at 42-43. D'Onofrio, who monitored plaintiff's comings and goings, followed her into the cafeteria and got so close to plaintiff that she thought he was going to hit her. He yelled at plaintiff, and ordered her to go out and sign out on a second break sheet. Ibid.; Doc. #49-3 at 15. Plaintiff left the cafeteria and signed the sheet. #49-4 at 43. She then submitted a grievance about the incident that also discussed the incidents described in the previous two paragraphs. Doc. #27-5 at 26-27. The grievance described D'Onofrio as engaging in "intimidation" and "professional bullying," and described his behavior as "personally alarming" and "threatening." Ibid. Plaintiff was in a great deal of stress due to D'Onofrio's treatment, and she left work for several days due to abdominal pains. Doc. #49-3 at 15.

On the morning of July 26, plaintiff was informed by her union steward that she was supposed to be at a 10:00 A.M. hearing that same day; plaintiff had not been scheduled to work until 4:00 P.M., and she had not previously been informed about the hearing. Doc. #49-4 at 70-71. Defendant Price was present at the hearing; D'Onofrio and Cowette were not. The hearing was a disciplinary hearing regarding plaintiff's cursing during her interaction with Cowetteregarding the work schedule. Doc. #49-3 at 16; Doc. #27-5 at 75. Plaintiff admitted that she had cursed, but said it was not directed at Cowette. Doc. #27-5 at 85. Plaintiff also raised D'Onofrio's aggressive behavior during the hearing twice, but she was rebuffed. Id. at 95, 99. Plaintiff was given a five-day suspension. Doc. #49-4 at 75. Price hand-delivered the suspension letter to plaintiff while she was at work, in view of her coworkers. Id. at 80. Afterward, Price laughed at plaintiff and stayed near plaintiff for several hours, leering at and monitoring her. Id. at 91.

On July 31, plaintiff was notified that she was being investigated for a claim made against her by Price. Id. at 86-87. Price had falsely claimed that after delivering the suspension letter to plaintiff, plaintiff had tried to intimidate her. Doc. #27-5 at 73; Doc. #49-4 at 89. The investigation did not result in discipline against plaintiff. Doc. #49-4 at 90. Yet plaintiff felt threatened by Price's false complaint, and so several days later, in early August, plaintiff met with an investigator with the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities (CHRO) to report the treatment she had been subjected to at work. Ibid.

On September 16, D'Onofrio once again came into the break room and screamed at plaintiff for not properly signing out. Doc. #49-4 at 49-50. D'Onofrio had been calling plaintiff names and following her around for months, and his aggressive approach in the break room made plaintiff "physically afraid." Id. at 55. Plaintiff told D'Onofrio that she had already signed out, and when he continued to scream at plaintiff, she told him to "back the fuck off." Ibid. D'Onofrio then told plaintiff "[h]ave it your way. We're going to do this the hard way." Id. at 58. Plaintiff told D'Onofrio that she had "a stack of documents at city hall regarding your behavior and harassment of me . . . Leave me alone or I'm going to go over your head and I'm going to pursue getting you fired for harassing and chasing me." Id. at 56.

Later that day, plaintiff submitted an additional grievance to her union regarding D'Onofrio's behavior. Id. at 57; Doc. #27-5 at 209. In her grievance, she said that the day's events were identical to complaints that she had formally discussed with the CHRO, and that she had scheduled a hearing with the CHRO "to pursue these matters and protect [herself] . . . from intimidation, harassment and discrimination." Doc. #27-5 at 209. She did not mention her gender or sexual orientation in the grievance. Id. at 209-10.

A few days later, plaintiff met with defendant Deida. Plaintiff asked Deida to help get D'Onofrio to leave plaintiff alone so she could feel safe and do her job. Doc. #49-4 at 59-60. Deida asked plaintiff for information about D'Onofrio regarding his behavior, his job performance, and the names of others whom he had harassed. Id. at 64-65. Plain...