O'Reilly v. La. Dep't of Educ.

PATRICK R. O'REILLY, Plaintiff v. LOUISIANA DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, et al., Defendants

CIVIL ACTION No. 11-1454

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT EASTERN DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA SECTION "E"

June 26, 2013

ORDER AND REASONS

Before the Court is a motion to dismiss pursuant to Rules 12(b)(1) and 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure filed by Defendants, the Louisiana Department of Education ("LDOE") and the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education ("BESE") (together, "Defendants").¹ Plaintiff, Patrick O'Reilly ("Plaintiff"), opposes the motion.² For the following reasons, the motion is GRANTED.

Background

Plaintiff, a white male, was born on February 28, 1950.³ In August 1991, he accepted a position at George Washington Carver High School in Orleans Parish, Louisiana.⁴ Following Hurricane Katrina, Plaintiff became a special education teacher at Sarah T. ReedHigh School ("Reed High") in the Recovery School District ("RSD") in July 2006.⁵ As of 2006, Plaintiff had approximately fifteen years experience teaching in Orleans Parish schools.⁶ He also had earned two bachelor's degrees and a master's degree in education and was certified in several areas including as a supervisor of student teaching, provisional principal, provisional secondary school principal, and mild/moderate special educator.⁷

Plaintiff was appointed interim assistant principal of Reed High in October 2007.⁸ He alleges that he intended to continue a career in school administration and that he made his intention known to his superiors at Reed High.⁹ Shortly thereafter, however, beginning in March 2008 and continuing through July 2008, Plaintiff alleges that he was given misleading and incorrect information regarding the requirements he needed to satisfy in order to remain a school administrator.¹⁰ Given that the person hired to fill the assistant principal position that he sought was a younger, African-American male with "substantially" less experience, Plaintiff believed that his superiors at Reed High had discriminated against him based on his age and race.¹¹ Consequently, he filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC") on August 15, 2008, alleging that he had been subjected to race discrimination under Title VII of the Civil RightsAct of 1964 ("Title VII") and age discrimination under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act ("ADEA").¹² The EEOC issued Plaintiff a right-to-sue letter on October 29, 2009, based on the alleged discrimination at Reed High.¹³ Defendants note, and Plaintiff concedes, that he did not pursue a lawsuit against defendants within ninety days of receiving his right-to-sue letter in 2009.¹⁴

After Plaintiff did not secure the assistant principal position at Reed High in summer 2008, he accepted a teaching position at L. E. Rabouin High School ("Rabouin High"), also in the RSD, for the 2008-2009 school year.¹⁵ Following the 2009-2010 school year, the RSD closed Rabouin High and offered Plaintiff a position at L. B. Landry High School ("Landry High") on June 16, 2010.¹⁶ Shortly thereafter, on September 16, 2010, Landry High principal Natalie Franklin ("Franklin") and her mentor, Shan Williams ("Williams"), summoned Plaintiff to Franklin's office.¹⁷ Plaintiff alleges that Franklin and Williams then"falsely accused" him of "denying services to the parents of a special needs child."¹⁸ Franklin and Williams, both of whom are allegedly "substantially younger" and are "of a different racial and/or ethnic background" than Plaintiff, "refused to allow [him] to present facts or explain the alleged incident in any way."¹⁹

Out of frustration, Plaintiff claims that he "spontaneously remarked" that he "'might as well resign'" if he would not be permitted to defend himself.²⁰ As a result of this "alleged 'verbal resignation,'"²¹ Plaintiff states that he was forced to pack his belongings and was escorted from school grounds by two security guards while teachers and school staff still occupied the building.²² Due to this purported mistreatment and the suggestion that he "should simply retire" rather than pursue any type of grievance proceeding, Plaintiff filed a second charge of race and age discrimination with the EEOC on February 8, 2011.²³ The EEOC issued Plaintiff a second right-to-sue letter on May 5, 2011.²⁴

Plaintiff filed this complaint on June 20, 2011, within ninety days of receiving his second right-to-sue letter. In it he alleges that the events in March through July 2008 andin September 2010, give rise to numerous causes of action against defendants, including violations of 42 U.S.C. §§ 1981 and 1983, Title VII, the ADEA, the Louisiana Employment Discrimination Law ("LEDL," La. Rev. Stat. § 23:301, et seq.) and Louisiana education law (La. Rev. Stat. § 17:441, et seq.), breach of contract, deprivation of property rights without due process in violation of both the federal and Louisiana constitutions, breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing, abuse of right, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

STANDARD OF LAW

I. Rule 12(b)(1)

A motion to dismiss filed pursuant to Rule 12(b)(1) "allow[s] a party to challenge the subject matter jurisdiction of the district court to hear a case." Ramming v. United States, 281 F.3d 158, 161 (5th Cir. 2001). The party asserting jurisdiction carries the burden of proof. Id. The district court may base its determination as to its subject-matter jurisdiction on: "(1) the complaint alone; (2) the complaint supplemented by undisputed facts evidenced in the record; or (3) the complaint supplemented by undisputed facts plus the court's resolution of disputed facts." Id.

If a Rule 12(b)(1) motion is filed in conjunction with other Rule 12 motions, a court should address the jurisdictional attack before reaching arguments that attack the merits of a plaintiff's claims. Id. "A court's dismissal of a case for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction is not a decision on the merits, and the dismissal does not necessarily prevent the plaintiff from pursuing the claim in another forum." Advocacy Ctr. for the Elderly & Disabled v. La. Dep't of Health & Hosp., 731 F. Supp. 2d 583, 588 (E.D. La. 2010) (citing Hitt v. City of Pasadena, 561 F.2d 606, 608 (5th Cir. 1977)).

II. Rule 12(b)(6)

Pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6), a district court may dismiss a complaint, or any part of it, for failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted if the plaintiff has not set forth factual allegations in support of his claim that would entitle him to relief. Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007); Cuvillier v. Taylor, 503 F.3d 397, 401 (5th Cir. 2007). As the Fifth Circuit explained in Gonzalez v. Kay:

"Factual allegations must be enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative level." Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555, 127 S.Ct. 1955, 167 L.Ed.2d 929 (2007). The Supreme Court recently expounded upon the Twombly standard, explaining that "[t]o survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to 'state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.'" Ashcroft v. Iqbal, --- U.S. ----, 129 S.Ct. 1937, 1949, 173 L.Ed.2d 868 (2009) (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570, 127 S.Ct. 1955, 167 L.Ed.2d 929). "A claim has facial plausibility when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged." Id. It follows that "where the well-pleaded facts do not permit the court to infer more than the mere possibility of misconduct, the complaint has alleged - but it has not 'show[n]' - that the pleader is entitled to relief. " Id. at 1950 (quoting Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2)).

577 F.3d 600, 603 (5th Cir. 2009).

This Court cannot look beyond the factual allegations in the pleadings to determine whether relief should be granted. See Spivey v. Robertson, 197 F.3d 772, 774 (5th Cir. 1999); Baker v. Putnal, 75 F.3d 190, 196 (5th Cir. 1996). In assessing the complaint, a court must accept all well-pleaded facts as true and liberally construe all factual allegations in the light most favorable to the plaintiff. Spivey, 197 F.3d at 774; Lowrey v. Tex. A & M Univ. Sys., 117 F.3d 242, 247 (5th Cir. 1997). "Dismissal is appropriate when the complaint 'on its face show[s] a bar to relief.'" Cutrer v. McMillan, 308 F. App'x 819, 820 (5th Cir. 2009)(per curiam) (unpublished) (quoting Clark v. Amoco Prod. Co., 794 F.2d 967, 970 (5th Cir. 1986)).

ANALYSIS

I. Sovereign Immunity

Sovereign immunity is a limit on the Court's subject-matter jurisdiction that prevents an individual from suing a state in federal court unless the state waives its immunity or Congress, acting pursuant to a post-Eleventh Amendment constitutional power, properly abrogates it. U.S. Const. amend. XI; Pennhurst State Sch. & Hosp., 465 U.S. 89, 95 (1984); Hans v. Louisiana, 134 U.S. 1, 21 (1890). The U.S. Supreme Court has held that sovereign immunity extends not only to the state itself, but also to "state agents or state instrumentalities." Regents of the Univ. of California v. Doe, 519 U.S. 425, 429, (1997) ("It has long been settled that the reference [in the Eleventh Amendment] to actions 'against one of the United States' encompasses not only actions in which a State is actually named as the defendant, but also certain actions against state agents and state instrumentalities."). The Fifth Circuit and other sections of this Court have held that Defendants are, as state agencies, arms of the state and entitled to sovereign immunity. Swindle v. Livingston Parish Sch. Bd., 655 F.3d 386, 399 (5th Cir. 2011) ("The State Superintendent of Education, sued in his official capacity, the [L]DOE and the BESE, argue that they are immune from the suit because they are entitled to sovereign immunity. We agree."); Williams v. Recovery Sch. Dist., 859 F. Supp. 2d 824, 832 (E.D. La. 2012) ("[T]he Louisiana Department of Education and the Board of Elementary...