Nguyen v. Elwood Staffing Servs.

NHU NGUYEN, Plaintiff v. ELWOOD STAFFING SERVICES, INC.d/b/a BERKS & BEYOND EMPLOYMENT SERVICES, et al., Defendants

No. 1:18-cv-01313

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA

September 9, 2019

(Judge Kane)

MEMORANDUM

Before the Court are: (1) Defendant Elwood Staffing Services, Inc. ("Defendant Elwood")'s motion to dismiss Plaintiff Nhu Nguyen ("Plaintiff")'s complaint for failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) (Doc. No. 9) and (2) Plaintiff's motion for leave to file an amended complaint (Doc. No. 17). Based on the following, the Court will grant Plaintiff's motion for leave to file an amended complaint (Doc. No. 17) and deny Defendant Elwood's motion to dismiss (Doc. No. 9) as moot.

I. BACKGROUND

A. Procedural Background

Plaintiff initiated the above-captioned action by filing a four-count complaint against Defendants Elwood and the Hershey Company ("Defendant Hershey") on June 28, 2018. (Doc. No. 1.) Plaintiff's complaint alleges Title VII violations stemming from her termination of employment. (Id.) Defendant Hershey filed an answer to Plaintiff's complaint on September 12, 2018. (Doc. No. 7.) On September 20, 2018, Defendant Elwood filed the instant motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). (Doc. No. 9.) Defendant Elwood's motion to dismiss has been fully briefed. (Doc. Nos. 12, 20, 24.) On October 25, 2018, Plaintiff filed the instant motion for leave file an amended complaint, through which she seeks to add System One Holdings, LLC ("System One") as a defendant in the above-captioned action. (Doc. No. 17.)¹ Plaintiff filed a brief in support of her motion on October 26, 2018. (Doc. No. 18.) Defendant Elwood filed a brief in opposition to Plaintiff's motion for leave to file an amended complaint on November 7, 2018. (Doc No. 19.) On June 7, 2019, the Court ordered Defendant Elwood and Plaintiff to address the potential applicability of the Supreme Court's opinion in Fort Bend County, Texas v. Davis, 587 U.S. ___ (2019), to the Court's disposition of the instant motion to dismiss. (Doc. No. 25.) Defendant Elwood and Plaintiff submitted filings responsive to the Court's June 7, 2019 Order in June of 2019. (Doc. Nos. 26-28.) Accordingly, both motions are ripe for disposition.

B. Factual Background²

The allegations in Plaintiff's proposed amended complaint stem from Plaintiff's allegedly discriminatory termination of employment by System One and Defendants Hershey and Elwood. (Doc. No. 17-2.) Plaintiff contends that she was placed as a "temporary employee" with Defendant Hershey through System One and Defendant Elwood. (Id. ¶ 9.) Plaintiff alleges that while she held that position, Defendants were her joint employers. (Id. ¶ 8.) She further alleges that she "was told that if her performance and attendance were satisfactory over a period of time, she would be hired directly by [Defendant] Hershey as a full-time employee." (Id. ¶ 10.) Plaintiff asserts that she began quality control training in that position on May 11, 2017 and completed training on May 19, 2019, at which point she commenced her duties performingquality control work, checking for defective products on the assembly line. (Id. ¶¶ 11, 12.) Plaintiff, who is of Vietnamese national origin, alleges that she "was treated with unjustified animosity" on a daily basis by her worksite supervisors, at least some of whom were employed by System One. (Id. ¶¶ 3, 14, 15.) On May 26, 2017, Plaintiff was unable to enter her work area because her entry pass had been deactivated. (Id. ¶ 16.) Plaintiff alleges that after she was escorted to another area, the agent of System One and Defendants Hershey and Elwood, a non-Vietnamese individual named Kelly, informed Plaintiff that she was discharged from her position and told Plaintiff to clean out her locker. (Id. ¶ 17.) When Plaintiff inquired with Defendant Elwood as to the reason she had been terminated, she was allegedly informed that Defendant Hershey terminated her because "they could not understand" Plaintiff. (Id. ¶ 18.) Plaintiff alleges that at that point, she concluded that the animosity that her supervisors directed toward her was based on her Vietnamese accent. (Id. ¶ 19.) Plaintiff asserts that she speaks fluent English with a Vietnamese accent, that her accent did not seriously interfere with her job performance when she was employed by System One and Defendants Hershey and Elwood, and that her accent had never hindered her job performance in the twenty-three (23) years that she had previously worked for the United States Postal Service. (Id. ¶¶ 20-22.) Plaintiff alleges that she learned that Defendant Hershey "claimed that [D]efendant Elwood made the decision to terminate [P]laintiff based upon her purported poor performance." (Id. at ¶ 25.) Plaintiff alleges that the proffered reasons put forth by Defendants Elwood and Hershey were "false and [were] mere pretext to mask [their] discriminatory animus" (id. at ¶¶ 23, 26) and Plaintiff's national origin and Vietnamese accent were the true reasons for her termination (id. at ¶¶ 24, 27). Plaintiff claims that as a consequence of her termination, she was "subjected to humiliation, embarrassment, and mental anguish." (Id. ¶ 34.)

II. LEGAL STANDARD

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(a) embodies a liberal approach to amendment of pleadings, instructing that a "court should freely give leave [to amend a pleading] when justice so requires." See Fed. R. Civ. P. 15(a)(2); see also Foman v. Davis, 371 U.S. 178, 182 (1962) ("[T]his mandate is to be heeded."). The Third Circuit has concluded that "[l]eave to amend must generally be granted unless equitable considerations render it otherwise unjust." See Arthur v. Maersk, Inc., 434 F.3d 196, 204 (3d Cir. 2006). Among the grounds that may justify a court's denial of leave to amend are "undue delay, bad faith or dilatory motive on the part of the movant, repeated failure to cure deficiencies by amendments previously allowed, undue prejudice to the opposing party by virtue of allowance of the amendment, [and] futility of amendment." See Foman, 371 U.S. at 182. A pleading will be deemed futile if, as amended, it fails to state a claim upon which relief may be granted. See In re Burlington Coat Factory Sec. Litig., 114 F.3d 1410, 1434 (3d Cir. 1997); Jablonski v. Pan Am. World Airways, Inc., 863 F.2d 289, 292 (3d Cir. 1988) ("Amendment of the complaint is futile if the amendment will not cure the deficiency in the original complaint or if the amended complaint cannot withstand a renewed motion to dismiss."). In assessing futility, a court applies the standard of legal sufficiency set forth under Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. See In re Burlington Coat Factory Sec. Litig., 114 F.3d at 1434 (citing Glassman v. Computervision Corp., 90 F.3d 617, 623 (1st Cir. 1996)).

III. DISCUSSION

The proposed amended complaint included as an exhibit to Plaintiff's motion for leave to file an amended complaint (Doc. No. 17-2) contains the same factual allegations presented in Plaintiff's original complaint (Doc. No. 1), in addition to a number of additional factualallegations relating to System One. The proposed amended complaint also adds System One as a defendant and asserts two Title VII claims of national origin discrimination against System One, which mirror the Title VII claims of national origin discrimination asserted against Defendants Hershey and Elwood in both the original complaint and the proposed amended complaint. (Id. ¶¶ 43-43, 48-49.)

A. Parties' Arguments

Plaintiff argues that because she has properly alleged a commonality of interests between System One and Defendants Hershey and Elwood and that System One was put on notice of the underlying Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC") charges, her failure to name System One in the EEOC proceedings does not prevent her from asserting a Title VII claim against System One. (Doc No. 18 at 4-5.) Plaintiff contends that she has properly alleged notice in regard to System One based on its notification by Defendants Hershey or Elwood. (Id. at 5-6.) Finally, Plaintiff asserts that although Defendant Elwood raised the issue of exhaustion, neither defendant has challenged the sufficiency of the underlying discrimination claims, and because Plaintiff's proposed amended complaint asserts the same claims against System One, those claims should also be deemed sufficient at this stage of the proceedings. (Id. at 7.)

In opposition to Plaintiff's motion, Defendant Elwood argues that the Court should deny Plaintiff's motion for leave to file an amended complaint because amendment would be futile. (Doc. No. 19.) Defendant Elwood asserts that Plaintiff failed to name System One in the underlying EEOC proceedings and "has failed to demonstrate that System One and [Defendant] Elwood have the requisite commonality of interest" required to assert a Title VII claim against a party not named in the underlying EEOC proceedings. (Id. at 1-2, 5-7.) Defendant Elwoodfurther asserts that Plaintiff has failed to allege any facts that would provide any other basis to excuse Plaintiff's failure to name System One in the EEOC proceedings. (Id. at 7-9.)

Defendant Elwood next argues that even if there is a basis to excuse Plaintiff's failure to name System One in the charges filed with the EEOC, amendment of Plaintiff's complaint would be futile because Plaintiff's "proposed claim against System One is time barred, just like her claims against [Defendants] Elwood [] and Hershey." (Id. at 9.) Citing the arguments articulated in its briefing in support of its motion to dismiss Plaintiff's complaint, Defendant Elwood argues that because Plaintiff filed her EEOC charge 221 days after her termination, her claim is time barred because Title VII requires individuals to file discrimination charges ...