Robinson v. Wash. Metro. Area Transit Auth.

VICTORIA ROBINSON, Plaintiff, v. WASHINGTON METROPOLITAN AREA TRANSIT AUTHORITY, Defendant.

Civil Action No. 18-2383 (JEB)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

February 7, 2020

MEMORANDUM OPINION

Plaintiff Victoria Robinson, who struggles with depression and anxiety, believes that her former employer, Defendant Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, unlawfully discriminated against her in violation of the Family Medical Leave Act and the Rehabilitation Act. Contending that it acted appropriately, WMATA now moves for summary judgment on all claims. Because Plaintiff fails to even dispute many of Defendant's factual and legal assertions, the Court will grant the Motion as to the FMLA claims and those Rehabilitation Act claims relating to her 2018 termination. As she has done just enough to proceed on her Rehabilitation Act claim regarding her forced change of position in 2017, however, the Court will deny the Motion in part.

I. Background

As described more fully below, Robinson has not filed a Statement of Disputed Material Facts or otherwise offered record citations. The Court, accordingly, draws its facts here largely from Defendant's submissions.

Robinson suffers from major depressive disorder and general anxiety disorders. See ECF No. 18-6 (Declaration of Yasmin Mitchell), Exh. B (Accommodation Requests) at 2-3. From 2013 to 2017, she worked as a Senior Financial Systems Analyst at WMATA. See ECF No. 23 (Pl. Opp. to Def. MSJ) at 2-3; ECF No. 23-2 (Pl. Interrog.) at 6. In December 2013, Robinson requested — and WMATA approved — a disability accommodation allowing her to work 30 hours per week instead of the typical 40. See ECF No. 20 at 27; Pl. Interrog. at 6. Robinson alleges, without any specificity, that she was pressured to return full-time while working under a modified schedule between 2013 and 2016. See ECF No. 20-1 (Pl. Oct. 17, 2019, Dep.) at 39-40. Between 2014 and 2015, Plaintiff's performance evaluations reported "improvement required." Id. at 39, 49.

In March 2017, WMATA transferred Robinson to a new position; it informed her that her disability accommodation would not transfer and that she would need to file a new request. See Pl. Interrog. at 6; ECF No. 18-5 (Declaration of Avraam R. Patriotis), ¶ 7. She promptly did so. See Accommodation Requests at 1-5. WMATA denied her requests, however, and sent her a letter explaining the decision and offering four alternative accommodations. See Mitchell Decl., Exh. C (Denial Letter). Robinson apparently never responded. See Mitchell Decl., ¶ 10; Pl. Opp. at 7-8.

Following her transfer in 2017, she was placed on a Performance Improvement Plan. See Patriotis Decl., Exh. A (Performance Review Memo) at 1; Pl. Interrog. at 6 (claiming this Plan was "illegal," but failing to explain why). She was ultimately terminated in February 2018. See Pl. Opp. at 4; ECF No. 18-2 (Def. SMF), ¶ 8. WMATA asserts that this action was merited given Robinson's history of poor work performance. See Mitchell Decl., ¶ 4.

After exhausting the EEOC administrative process, Robinson brought this suit alleging unlawful discrimination and retaliation under the FMLA and the Rehabilitation Act. See ECF No. 9 (Am. Compl.), ¶¶ 2-5, 25-32. She claims that WMATA discriminated against her by transferring and terminating her, and that it unlawfully denied her request for a new accommodation after her transfer. Id., ¶¶ 25-32. Defendant has now moved for summary judgment on all counts.

II. Legal Standard

Summary judgment must be granted "if the movant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). A fact is "material" if it can affect the substantive outcome of the litigation. Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, 477 U.S. 242, 248 (1986); Holcomb v. Powell, 433 F.3d 889, 895 (D.C. Cir. 2006). A dispute is "genuine if the evidence is such that a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the non-moving party." Liberty Lobby, 477 U.S. at 248; see Scott v. Harris, 550 U.S. 372, 380 (2007); Holcomb, 433 F.3d at 895.

When a motion for summary judgment is under consideration, "[t]he evidence of the nonmovant is to be believed, and all justifiable inferences are to be drawn in [her] favor." Liberty Lobby, 477 U.S. at 255 (citing Adickes v. S.H. Kress & Co., 398 U.S. 144, 158-59 (1970)). The nonmoving party's opposition, however, must consist of more than mere unsupported allegations. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(e); Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 323-24 (1986). "A party asserting that a fact cannot be or is genuinely disputed must support the assertion" by "citing to particular parts of materials in the record," such as affidavits, declarations, or other evidence. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c)(1).

In light of this requirement, and pursuant to Local Rule 7(h), the Court, in resolving summary-judgment motions, "may assume that facts identified by the moving party in the statement of material facts are admitted, unless such a fact is controverted in the statement of genuine issues filed in opposition to the motion." These rules "assist[ ] the district court to maintain docket control and to decide motions for summary judgment efficiently and effectively." Jackson v. Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner, 101 F.3d 145, 150 (D.C. Cir. 1996). "The procedure contemplated by the rule thus isolates the facts that the parties assert are material, distinguishes disputed from undisputed facts, and identifies the pertinent parts of the record." Id. at 150-51 (quoting Gardels v. CIA, 637 F.2d 770, 773 (D.C. Cir. 1980)).

III. Analysis

The Court begins by addressing a procedural defect raised by WMATA before moving to the merits of Robinson's FMLA and Rehabilitation Act claims.

A. Procedural Challenge

As noted above, WMATA points out that Robinson has not complied with Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(e) and Local Rule 7(h). See ECF No. 24 (Def. Reply) at 2. Defendant is, for the most part, correct. To begin, Plaintiff submits no separate statement of disputed material facts, as Local Rule 7(h)(1) requires. In addition, her Opposition never points to specific portions of WMATA's Statement of Facts with which she disagrees. See Pl. Opp. at 1-4. Indeed, the factual recitation in her brief contains no record citations at all. Instead, much of it merely repeats verbatim her Amended Complaint. Compare Am. Compl., ¶¶ 7-15, 17, with Pl. Opp., ¶¶ 7-15, 17. To make matters more confusing, it oscillates between first and third person. See Pl. Opp., ¶ 6 ("Plaintiff was going through a grievance that involved my performance evaluation . . . .").

Only three record citations appear anywhere in her brief. See Pl. Opp. at 6. She cites her 14-page interrogatory responses with no meaningful indication of the document's relevance or contents. And she cites two vague affidavits from former colleagues — one purporting to "corroborate with all the issues set forth by [Robinson]," ECF No. 23-3 (Affidavit of Edward T. Riddick) at 1, and the other attesting to her mental state in the workplace. See ECF No. 23-4 (Affidavit of Eliza Comer) at 1. These citations make it difficult to determine the significance of the materials she included and leave the Court guessing about the inferences she would have it draw from them.

Such deficiencies could alone warrant a grant of summary judgment in WMATA's favor. See SEC v. Banner Fund Int'l, 211 F.3d 602, 615-16 (D.C. Cir. 2000) (upholding district court's grant of summary judgment for SEC because defendant failed to follow Local Rule 7.1(h)). Indeed, Local Rule 7(h) "embodies the thought that judges 'are not like pigs, hunting for truffles buried in briefs' or the record." Potter v. Dist. of Columbia, 558 F.3d 542, 533 (D.C. Cir. 2009) (Williams, J., concurring) (quoting United States v. Dunkel, 927 F.2d 995, 956 (7th Cir. 1991)). The Court, consequently, "is not 'obliged to sift through hundreds of pages of depositions, affidavits, and interrogatories in order to make [its] own analysis and determinations of what may, or may not, be a genuine issue of material disputed fact.'" Id. at 550 (alteration in original) (quoting Twist v. Meese, 854 F.2d 1421, 1425 (D.C. Cir. 1988)).

Yet, mindful of the impact of granting summary judgment and unwilling to take such a step lightly, the Court has waded through the materials both parties submitted in docket entries 18, 20, 23, and 24. It now turns to the merits, noting that it will treat as admitted all of WMATA's facts that Robinson failed to contest.

B. FMLA

WMATA first asserts that it is entitled to sovereign immunity against Robinson's oblique claims under the FMLA. See Def. MSJ at 3-4. Plaintiff never responds to this argument at all. See Pl. Opp. 5-8. In this Circuit, when a plaintiff does not respond to an issue raised by a defendant on summary judgment, the Court may treat that argument as conceded. See Singh v. Dist. of Columbia, 55 F. Supp. 3d 55, 66 (D.D.C. 2014); Iweala v. Operational Techs. Servs., Inc., 634 F. Supp. 2d 73, 80-81 (D.D.C. 2009). The Court therefore grants WMATA's Motion as to this claim.

C. Rehabilitation Act

Robinson contends that WMATA violated the Rehabilitation Act by (1) denying her accommodation request following her transfer by (2) discriminating and (3) retaliating against her when it transferred and ultimately terminated her. The Act "prohibits federal agencies from engaging in employment discrimination against disabled individuals." Nuriddin v. Bolden, 818 F.3d 751, 756 (D.C. Cir. 2016) (citing 29 U.S.C. § 791(b)). It "bars several different types of discrimination" including "failure to accommodate," "intentional discrimination," and "retaliation." Welch v. Skorton, 299 F. Supp. 3d 102, 108 (D.D.C. 2018) (quoting Drasek v. Burwell, 121 F. Supp. 3d 143, 153-54 (D.D.C. 2015)). When assessing the obligations of an employer under the Rehabilitation Act, courts apply the same standards as under the Americans with...