Pritchett v. State

477 N.J. Super. 597

309 A.3d 651

SHELLEY PRITCHETT, PLAINTIFF-RESPONDENT, v. STATE OF NEW JERSEY, DEFENDANT-APPELLANT.

DOCKET NO. A-1414-21

Superior Court of New Jersey Appellate Division

Argued October 18, 2023—Decided January 30, 2024

On appeal from the Superior Court of New Jersey, Law Division, Mercer County, Docket No. L-2189-13.

Before Judges Currier, Susswein and Vanek.

Peter G. Verniero argued the cause for appellant (Sills Cummis & Gross, PC, attorneys; Peter G. Verniero and Michael S. Carucci, of counsel and on the briefs).

Deborah Lynn Mains argued the cause for respondent (Costello & Mains, LLC, attorneys; Deborah Lynn Mains and Miriam S. Edelstein, on the brief).

The opinion of the court was delivered by

CURRIER, P.J.A.D.

This case, arising out of a failure to accommodate and discrimination action under the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination (LAD), N.J.S.A. 10:5-1 to -50, returns to us after remand. A jury returned a verdict for plaintiff awarding her compensatory damages and $10 million in punitive damages. On appeal, we affirmed the finding of liability and the compensatory damage award but remanded for further proceedings on the amount of punitive damages, and specifically, for substantial consideration of the factors discussed by our Supreme Court in Baker v. National State Bank, 161 N.J. 220, 736 A.2d 462 (1999), and the United States Supreme Court in BMW of North America, Inc. v. Gore, 517 U.S. 559, 116 S.Ct. 1589, 134 L.Ed.2d 809 (1996). Pritchett v. State, No. A-1956-17, 2020 WL 1966539 (App. Div. Apr. 24, 2020) (slip op. at 1-2, 79-84), modified and aff’d, 248 N.J. 85, 256 A.3d 999 (2021).

Our Supreme Court granted defendant’s petition for certification and modified this court’s remand instructions. The Court held that when reviewing a punitive damages award against a public entity, a trial court must not only consider the Baker/BMW factors, but also needs to apply heightened scrutiny as required under Lockley v. State, Department of Corrections, 177 N.J. 413, 828 A.2d 869 (2003). Pritchett v. State (Pritchett I), 248 N.J. 85, 88, 256 A.3d 999 (2021).

Following remand from the Supreme Court, the trial court considered the parties’ briefs and oral arguments and determined the punitive damages verdict was "reasonable" and "comport[ed] with due process" even when examined with "heightened scrutiny." In employing a de novo review and applying heightened scrutiny to the BMW/Baker factors, we conclude the amount of the punitive damages award was not unreasonable. We affirm.

I.

The facts were thoroughly detailed in our prior opinion and Pritchett I. For the reader’s ease and context for our decision, we reproduce the facts set forth in Pritchett I.

Pritchett was hired by the Juvenile Justice Center (JJC) in 2006. The JJC runs the state’s juvenile correctional facilities and has approximately 400 employees at any given time. Pritchett worked as a corrections officer in a JJC facility, and, by 2011, she held the title of Senior Corrections Officer [(SCO)]. Her duties included the responsibility to intervene when violence broke out among inmates.

On June 8, 2011, Pritchett broke up a fight between two inmates. As a result, she suffered injuries to her back, knee, and neck, went on Workers’ Compensation leave, and sought medical assistance.

In the fall of that year, Pritchett’s physician noticed that an MRI of Pritchett’s spine revealed abnormalities unrelated to her workplace injuries. Because of those abnormalities and Pritchett’s physical complaints, her physician suspected that Pritchett was suffering from the early stages of multiple sclerosis (MS). In a note dated September 17, 2011, her physician wrote that Pritchett had recovered from her workplace injuries and could return to work with no restrictions on their account, but the doctor recommended that Pritchett ask for additional leave time toseek a diagnosis and treatment for her underlying health issues and referred her to a neurologist.

Consistent with the physician’s recommendation. Pritchett submitted a request for unpaid leave from her JJC position. Two days later, human resources (HR) officers forwarded the request to the Acting Director of the JJC, Captain Kelly Gibson, and to Pritchett’s direct supervisor, Lisa Quinto. An internal email to Gibson indicates that HR had planned to approve the request; however, Captain Gibson was against it, HR then turned for support to Quinto, who, on September 27, emailed Gibson, telling him that Pritchett’s "diagnosis is rather serious," She went on, "[y]ou may wish to consider approving this leave through November 1, 2011. This way we can write to her now and advise her no further leave will be approved beyond November 1 and if she is not medically cleared to return to work, she must resign," Quinto explained to Captain Gibson.

If you determine she must return to work now. based on the medical, there will be no way she can return and we really have not given her warning that management will not approve further leave beyond a request to extend. If she cannot return in November and does not resign, you will have a stronger case to take steps to remove her and be more readily able to defend the removal in an appeal setting. Since [it’s] only one plus month, we can give her fair warning she must return and then if she does not, you stand a much better chance of winning an appeal.

Nonetheless, Captain Gibson remained committed to denying Pritchett’s request. HR then sought out the JJC’s Deputy Executive Director for Operations, Felix Mickens, forwarding him Quinto’s exchange with Gibson and adding that

[t]o deny leave at this point will surely result in a removal (she has a very serious diagnosis) which will be appealed and not upheld. She will not be able to return to work (she incurred a work-related injury which resulted in the discovery of an unrelated personal medical condition) and we have not advised her management will not approve further leave. With removals we have established a winning defense ….

November is right around the corner—management should approve leave through this date as the medical states—we will write to her and say no further leave—if she does not, or cannot return, she can resign [or] we can initiate removal for failure to return from an approved leave of absence.

Pritchett’s request was ultimately approved on October 11, granting her unpaid leave through November 1, 2011, but the approval came with the caveat that no further requests would be granted. She was informed that if she did not return to work on November 2, she would be expected to resign.

On October 19, Pritchett was diagnosed with MS. She requested additional leave time through February 29, 2012, with an expected return-to-work date of March 1. Gibson and Quinto both denied the request in internal emails. Upon receiving word of the denial, Pritchett telephoned Quinto, who would not provide an explanation as to why the JJC denied Pritchett’s request. Instead, she told Pritchett that the JJC was not obligated to give her a reason, and then declined to put the denial in writing.

When November 1 came, Pritchett wrote to the JJC’s HR manager, stating that she was not able to return to work, but that she did not want to resign. Mickens answered the letter through Pritchett’s union representative, telling her that Pritchett would be subject to disciplinary proceedings—which would result in her termination without a pension—if she did not resign by the end of the week, Pritchett submitted an application for retirement disability benefits on November 4.

Thereafter, on November 21, Pritchett’s union representative contacted the JJC’s Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) coordinator, informing the coordinator that Pritchett believed she was forced into retirement against her will. The coordinator answered that since Pritchett had already resigned, it was too late to engage in the ADA’s interactive process and advised Pritchett to contact the JJC’s Equal Opportunity Office. When it responded to Pritchett’s request for reinstatement, that Office expressed its opinion that the JJC "failed to engage in the interactive process …. This failure to engage in the interactive process resulted in a violation of the State Anti-Discrimination Policy." However, the Office agreed with the ADA coordinator that Pritchett’s "request for reinstatement [was] mooted by [her] approval for disability retirement."

….

In October 2013, Pritchett filed a complaint against the State of New Jersey and unnamed John Does, alleging that the State violated the LAD by failing to accommodate her disability and discriminating based on the perception of disability. Following the State’s unsuccessful attempts to end the matter through motion practice, the trial court conducted a jury trial in June 2017.

The trial resulted in the jury’s return of a liability verdict in favor of Pritchett. The jury awarded compensatory damages totaling $1,824,911, which consisted of $575,000 for emotional distress; $343,789 in back pay; $472,639 in front pay; and $433,483 in future pension benefits.

The next day, the court reconvened the jury for a proceeding on punitive damages, during which the parties presented no new evidence. The jury’s deliberations were brief, lasting from shortly after 2:00 p.m. until about 3:00 p.m.

The jury awarded Pritchett $10 million in punitive damages. All totaled, the trial court entered a judgment of $12,015,384.44 for Pritchett. That amount encompassed $78,367.65 in pre-judgment interest; $22,235.79 in costs; $11,824,911 in compensatory and punitive damages; and $89,870 in attorneys’ fees.

[Pritchett I, 248 N.J. at 89-92, 256 A.3d 999 (alterations in original).]

We include additional facts elicited during trial that are important to our analysis of the issue on appeal. On November 1, 2013, the JJC revised its Leave of Absence policy to state that leaves would be subject to the approval of management and possible reasonable accommodation through the ADA...