Karimpour v. Stanley Black & Decker, Inc.

Amin Karimpour, Plaintiff, v. Stanley Black & Decker, Inc. et al., Defendants.

Civil Action No. 21-11498-NMG

United States District Court, D. Massachusetts

May 2, 2022

MEMORANDUM & ORDER

Nathaniel M. Gorton, United States District Judge

This case arises from the claims of age-based employment discrimination brought by Amin Karimpour (“Karimpour” or “plaintiff”), a former employee of defendant corporation Stanley Black &amp Decker, Inc. (“Stanley”). Karimpour has also named Rhonda Gass (“Gass”) and Joseph Pereira (“Pereira”) (collectively, with Stanley “defendants”), both corporate officers at Stanley, as parties to this case and he brings state law claims for a hostile work environment, retaliation and discrimination under M.G.L. c. 151B (“Chapter 151B”).

Plaintiff commenced this action in Massachusetts Superior Court for Suffolk County in August, 2021. Defendants removed the case on diversity grounds pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1332(a).

Pending before this Court are defendants' motion to dismiss all but one of the causes of action for failure to state a claim (Docket No. 7), as well as Karimpour's motion to remand (Docket No 15). Although the motion to remand was filed later, this Court will consider it first to resolve whether it has subject matter jurisdiction over the instant litigation, a prerequisite to considering the motion to dismiss.

I. Background

As set forth in the complaint, Karimpour is a resident of Belmont, Massachusetts who began working at Stanley as a Business Systems Lead in 2017 when he was 53 years old. Stanley, headquartered in Connecticut, is a tool manufacturer with approximately 61, 000 employees. Pereira is the chief information officer of the division in which Karimpour worked; he reports to Gass, who is the chief information officer of the entire company.

Karimpour alleges that, during the summer of 2018, he proposed the creation of a new position of Business Relationship Manager (“BRM”), to his manager, Brian Furtak (“Furtak”). Furtak subsequently discussed the proposal with Pereira and ultimately informed Karimpour in October, 2018 that the company would create such a position to be filled by Tim Schuch (“Schuch”), who is younger than Karimpour.

Thereafter, Karimpour wrote to Furtak, explaining that Schuch was unqualified for the role and that Karimpour himself would be a better choice. In that communication, Karimpour stated that the only qualification Schuch possessed was “youthful energy”. Furtak later told Karimpour that Pereira had sought someone with “youthful enthusiasm” for the new position. In his new role Schuch directly supervised Karimpour.

In February, 2019, Karimpour filed a formal complaint with Convercent, a third-party administrator of internal complaints for Stanley, alleging that Pereira had discriminated against him on the basis of his age by failing to select him for the BRM position. Karimpour also asserted that Schuch, a graduate of a company-wide young leadership program, was given preferential treatment in the selection process and that Stanley had diverted from its own protocol in filling the new position. Karimpour contends that he subsequently faced pressure to withdraw that complaint. No action arose from it and it was ultimately closed, although Karimpour contends that the investigation into his allegations was insufficient.

During the spring of 2019, Karimpour submits that his team at Stanley underwent significant restructuring. An additional management position was created as part of that process and Stephen Mascola was purportedly selected for it by Pereira and Gass. In October, 2019, Karimpour lost his job during a company-wide reduction in force and he filed a complaint for discrimination with the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (“MCAD”) shortly thereafter. More than two and a half years later, Karimpour brought this action seeking $2, 400, 000 in damages.

II. Motion to Remand

A. Legal Standard

A defendant may remove a civil lawsuit initiated in state court to the United States District Court for the district where the state case was filed, so long as that court has “original jurisdiction” over the relevant case. 28 U.S.C. § 1441(a). Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1332(a), this Court has original jurisdiction of all civil actions where there is complete diversity of citizenship and the amount in controversy exceeds $75, 000. The party invoking federal jurisdiction must file a notice of removal within 30 days of being served with the initial pleading. 28 U.S.C. § 1446(b)(1).

That party also bears the burden of persuasion, see Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 561 (1992), and must support the alleged bases of federal jurisdiction with “competent proof, ” Hertz Corp. v. Friend, 559 U.S. 77, 96-97 (2010). In assessing those bases, the Court is not constrained by the allegations in the complaint and may consider all relevant evidence in the notice of removal and other case materials. See Egan, Flanagan & Cohen, P.C. v. Twin City Fire Ins. Co., No. CV 21-30041-NMG, 2021 WL 5207139, at *1 (D. Mass. Nov. 8, 2021); see also Sierminski v. Transouth Fin. Corp., 216 F.3d 945, 949 (11th Cir. 2000).

B. Application

Here, defendants assert that removal is appropriate because there is complete diversity of citizenship and the amount in controversy exceeds $75, 000. Defendants filed the notice of removal with this Court on September 13, 2021, after they were served with Karimpour's complaint on August 24, 2021.

The parties agree and the Court concurs that the amount in controversy requirement has been satisfied by the plaintiff's good faith claim for over $2 million in damages. Spielman v. Genzyme Corp., 251 F.3d 1, 5 (1st Cir. 2001). Karimpour contends, however, that the case should proceed in state court because: (1) Stanley is a “citizen of Massachusetts”, (2) removal is untimely (3) the claims arise from state law, (4) the related proceedings before the MCAD bar removal and (5) defendants are represented by local counsel. The three latter assertions are irrelevant to the jurisdictional analysis at issue on a motion to remand and the Court need not consider them further. See 28 U.S.C. § 1332(a); Theidon v. Harvard Univ., 948 F.3d 477, 505 (1st Cir. 2020) (federal court assessing state claims arising under M.G.L. c. 151B after MCAD proceedings). The Court assesses only the first and second grounds on which Karimpour seeks remand in greater detail.

For jurisdictional purposes, a domestic corporation such as Stanley is deemed to be a citizen of both the state where it is incorporated and the state in which it maintains its principal place of business, 28 U.S.C. § 1332(c)(1), as of the date of the lawsuit's commencement, see ConnectU LLC v. Zuckerberg, 522 F.3d 82, 91 (1st Cir. 2008). A corporation maintains its principal place of business at its “nerve center, ” the location from which the corporation's “officers direct, control, and coordinate the corporation's activities.” Hertz Corp., 559 U.S. at 92-93. The nerve center will not necessarily be where “the bulk of a company's business activities visible to the public take place” but rather where the “top officers [who] direct those activities” are employed. Id. at 96.

Karimpour asserts that Stanley is a citizen of Massachusetts because the corporation pays taxes in the Commonwealth, as well as employs people and maintains offices in the state. While those factors may be relevant to determine a corporation's principal place of business under certain circumstances, they are irrelevant here because parties agree that Stanley is incorporated in Connecticut and its corporate headquarters, i.e. “the place where the buck stops”, Harrison v. Granite Bay Care, Inc., 811 F.3d 36, 41 (1st Cir. 2016), is there. The presence of employees and offices in Massachusetts is insignificant because Stanley is a very large, national corporation. Stanley is therefore a citizen of Connecticut but not of Massachusetts.

Parties do not dispute that Karimpour resides in Massachusetts, Pereira in Indiana and Gass in Connecticut. Therefore, because the plaintiff is not a citizen of the state of any defendant, see Alvarez-Torres v. Ryder Mem'l Hosp., Inc., 582 F.3d 47, 53 (1st Cir. 2009), the requirement of complete diversity is satisfied.

Defendant also timely filed their notice of removal with this Court. For purpose of removal, timeliness is based upon Karimpour's state court action rather than his MCAD proceeding because a MCAD complaint cannot be removed directly to this Court. See Whelchel v. Regus Mgmt. Grp., LLC, 914 F.Supp.2d 83, 88 (D. Mass. 2012). Therefore, because less than 30 days elapsed between the defendants being served in the state court action and their filing, the notice was timely. 28 U.S.C. § 1446(b)(1).

The substantive and procedural requirements of removal have been satisfied and the plaintiff's motion to remand will therefore be denied.

III. Motion to Dismiss

A. Legal Standard

To survive a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim under Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6), a complaint must contain “sufficient factual matter” to state a claim for relief that is actionable as a matter of law and “plausible on its face.” Ashcroft v Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 667 (2009) (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)). A claim is facially plausible if, after accepting as true all non-conclusory factual allegations, the court can draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged. Ocasio Hernandez v. Fortuno Burset, 640 F.3d 1, 12 (1st Cir. 2011). A court may not disregard properly pled factual allegations even if actual proof of those facts is improbable. Id. Rather, the relevant inquiry focuses on the reasonableness of the inference of...