Julka v. Bd. of Educ. of Butler Sch. Dist. #53

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RAHUL JULKA, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, Cross-Appellees, v. BOARD OF EDUCATION OF BUTLER SCHOOL DISTRICT #53, et al., Defendants-Appellees, Cross-Appellants.

Nos. 20-2531, 20-2532

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit

November 29, 2021

NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION

Submitted November 23, 2021 ^[*]

Appeals from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. No. 17 C 2849 Matthew F. Kennelly, Judge.

Before MICHAEL B. BRENNAN, Circuit Judge AMY J. ST. EVE, Circuit Judge CANDACE JACKSON-AKIWUMI, Circuit Judge

ORDER

Rahul and Komal Julka, and their two children, sued parents of the children's classmates who accused the Julka parents of helping their children cheat in an academic competition. The Julkas also sued officials from the children's school and the Board of Education, alleging that these defendants violated their constitutional rights and committed various torts while investigating the accusations. The district court dismissed or entered summary judgment for the defendants on most of the Julkas' claims, but it held a trial on their claims of retaliation in violation of the First Amendment and intentional infliction of emotional distress. A jury found for the defendants on the retaliation claim, and on the tort claim except as to Rahul who obtained a verdict against the school board and one school official but was awarded no damages. On appeal, the Julkas contest the verdicts against them, the omission of damages for Rahul, and several of the court's pretrial rulings. The school board and a school official, Alan Hanzlik, cross-appeal, arguing that the district court erred by denying them judgment as a matter of law on Rahul's intentional-infliction-of-emotional-distress claim. We affirm.

Background

In 2016, the Julkas' elementary school withdrew the Julka children from the National Geographic Bee after other parents reported that they were preparing with the actual competition questions. After investigating the other parents' report, which included reviewing a recording of a complaining parent's conversation with Komal Julka, the school board banned the Julka children from participating in academic competitions, banned the parents from volunteering, placed letters about academic dishonesty in the children's permanent records, and mailed a letter to the families of students within the district, discussing the incident without naming the Julkas. The Julkas responded by filing a grievance with the school board, in which they asserted that the sanctions were based on unsupported accusations. The school board, with its attorneys, reviewed the grievance, investigated, and upheld all sanctions but one: it removed the letters from the children's files.

The Julkas then filed a seven-count federal lawsuit in which they alleged that the school defendants (the principal, the school board, and its lawyers) violated their due-process and equal-protection rights by singling them out for sanctions based on an inadequate internal investigation, and placed misconduct letters in the children's files in retaliation for their grievance. The Julkas also alleged that the school defendants inflicted emotional distress on the children, who were repeatedly questioned by school officials about the alleged cheating, and on Rahul, who experienced "humiliation [and] anguish," among other harms, as a result of the public accusations and the sanctions placed on the family. Finally, the Julkas brought claims of spoliation and intentional infliction of emotional distress based on allegations that the parents who accused them had conspired with the school defendants to destroy a recorded phone conversation with Komal about the competition and used a falsified transcript of that conversation in the investigation.

On the defendants' motions, the court dismissed a number of the Julkas' claims, leaving only the Julkas' retaliation and intentional infliction of emotional distress claims against the school board and the other parents. The remaining defendants then moved for summary judgment, and the district court partially granted those motions. It entered judgment for the parent defendants on the intentional-infliction-of-emotional-distress claims, and it refused a preliminary injunction preventing access to the children's disputed files because the dishonesty letter had already been removed. But the court allowed one child's retaliation claim and the family's intentional-infliction-of-emotional-distress claims to proceed against the school defendants after determining that there were factual disputes about the school defendants' motives and tactics both when interviewing that child and publicizing the accusations against the parents.

A jury found for the school defendants on all but Rahul's intentional-infliction-of-emotional-distress claim against the school board and one official, but it awarded him no compensatory damages. The defendants, who had moved for judgment as a matter of law before the verdict, renewed their motion afterward. See FED. R. CIV. P. 50(a), (b). But the district court explained that there was sufficient evidence for the jury to conclude that officials acted outrageously toward Rahul by publicizing the cheating accusations to the school community, imposing sanctions, and threatening litigation.

The Julkas moved for a new trial, see FED. R. CIV. P. 59(a), arguing that the defendants had failed to disclose evidence they used at trial, presented “surprise evidence” and “false testimony, ” and changed their theory of defense, which together had deprived the Julkas of a fair trial. The court denied the motion, explaining that the Julkas had waived the issues by failing to object to the alleged misconduct before the verdict, but that in any case the arguments lacked merit because the Julkas had “ample notice” of the defendants' positions before trial.

We consolidated the Julkas' two appeals, which, between them, challenge the denial of their motion for leave to amend their complaint a second time, the partial grant of summary judgment, and the denial of their motion for a new trial.^[1] The defendants cross-appeal, seeking to vacate the verdicts for Rahul on his emotional-distress claims, which they contend are unsupported by trial evidence and inconsistent with the finding that he had no compensable damages.

Analysis

We address the alleged errors chronologically, beginning with whether the district court abused its discretion by denying the Julkas leave to amend their complaint a second time. The Julkas, who were represented by counsel in the district court, sought leave to file a second amended complaint about 15 months after submitting their first amended complaint (the subject of the motion to dismiss) and two weeks after the close of fact discovery. The proposed second amended complaint reasserted or expanded long-dismissed claims from the first amended complaint-including retaliation and civil conspiracy claims against the school board's lawyers and the parents. They also attempted to add a new claim of intrusion on seclusion against the parents. The court denied the motion, explaining that although the proposed pleading added little more than "nuance" to their claims, it would require "a lot more discovery" and thereby cause "undue delay." Because the Julkas' proposed amendment was based on conduct they "had known about when they filed their previous complaint," and they had not explained why they could not have asserted the expanded claims earlier, the court concluded that permitting the amendment would unfairly prejudice defendants who had been dismissed from the case months earlier.

This decision was sound. The court acted within its discretion to deny leave to amend nearly a year and a half into litigation, see Lowinger v. Oberhelman, 924 F.3d 360, 370 (7th Cir. 2019), and after the close of discovery. See Landmark Am. Ins. Co. v. Deerfield Constr Inc., 933 F.3d 806, 816 (7th Cir. 2019). Having already extended the deadlines both to file their first amended complaint and to complete discovery, the district court was not required to reopen discovery so that the Julkas could add defendants and claims back to their case seven months after they were dismissed. Id.

Next the Julkas contest the entry of summary judgment for the other parents on Komal's claim of intentional infliction of emotional distress. The district court ruled, citing Taliani v. Resurreccion, 115 N.E.3d 1245, 1254 ( Ill. App. 2018), that no reasonable jury could find that the parents, whose involvement was limited and who were not in a position of power over the Julkas, subjected Komal to conduct that exceeded "the bounds of decency" when they recorded and shared with school officials a phone call in which Komal discussed the Geography Bee. The Julkas contend that a reasonable jury could find that the parents' conduct was extreme and outrageous and that the district court's contrary decision rests on "fraudulent" evidence because the phone recording was "deliberately mistranscribed and then destroyed/deleted."...