Sharma v. Wash. Metro. Area Transit Auth.

57 F.Supp.3d 36

Ramesh Sharma, Plaintiff

v.Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, et al., Defendants.

Civ. No. 03–1769 TFH

United States District Court, District of Columbia.

Signed July 17, 2014

David A. Branch, Law Office of David A. Branch, Washington, DC, for Plaintiff.

David J. Shaffer, Bruce P. Heppen, Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, Washington, DC, for Defendants.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

Thomas F. Hogan, Senior United States District Judge

Plaintiff Ramesh Sharma filed this action asserting claims for breach of contract and tortious interference. He also brings claims of discrimination and retaliation in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq. (“Title VII”). He alleges that defendants discriminated against him and retaliated against him by mistreating him in the workplace, refusing to retain him as an independent contractor, thwarting his efforts to obtain employment references from his former supervisors, and interfering with the calculation of his monthly retirement pension benefit. His breach of contract and tortious interference claims are based on the same factual allegations. Before the Court are defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment, plaintiff's Cross–Motion for Partial Summary Judgment, the oppositions and replies thereto, and the entire record of this case. For the reasons set forth below, the Court DENIES plaintiff's Cross–Motion for Partial Summary Judgment and GRANTS defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment in its entirety.

I. Background

It would be something of an understatement to say these parties have an extensive litigation history. In 1984, plaintiff and the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (“WMATA”) reached a settlement agreement with respect to claims of discrimination plaintiff had asserted. Mem. Op., Sharma v. Washington Metro. Area Transit Auth., 94–cv–305 (TFH) at 2 (D.D.C. Oct. 10, 2000). Five years later, plaintiff filed two additional claims of discrimination with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which the parties also settled. Id. Another claim of discrimination followed in 1993, which culminated in a lawsuit filed in 1994. Id. at 3. The parties devised a mutually acceptable Agreement in Principle resolving that litigation (“Settlement Agreement”) in November 2001. Compl. ¶ 10. Under the terms of the Settlement Agreement, plaintiff agreed to resign from WMATA. Pl.'s Amended/Corrected Opp. Defs.' Mot. Summ. J. and Cross Mot. Partial Summ. J. (“Pl.'s Br.”) at 2. The Settlement Agreement also provided that:

Plaintiff will not apply for any position with WMATA at any time in the future.

* * *

WMATA agrees to permit the Plaintiff to accept employment or [a] consulting position with any contractor doing work for [WMATA], except if there exists an actual or apparent conflict of interest.

Pl.'s Ex. A ¶¶ 11, 13. Otherwise, the Settlement Agreement contained relatively standard provisions, including a section that forbade WMATA from retaliating against plaintiff in the future, Compl. ¶ 31, and a provision that WMATA would provide neutral reference information to plaintiff's prospective employers. Id. ¶ 28.¹ The parties executed the Settlement Agreement on November 6, 2001. Pl.'s Ex. A ¶ 4.

Plaintiff has filed two different lawsuits related to the Settlement Agreement; the instant lawsuit, and a lawsuit focused primarily on plaintiff's claims that WMATA and its employees and agents improperly interfered with the computation of his monthly retirement pension benefit.²

Here, plaintiff alleges that WMATA and its employees began an intensive campaign of retaliation after he signed the Settlement Agreement. Pl.s' Ex. A ¶ 7. Specially, he contends that WMATA separated him from his staff and office equipment, threatened him with police action, and forcibly removed him from the WMATA building. Id. He also avouches that WMATA prevented his former colleagues from providing reference information to potential employers. Pl.'s Br. at 4. Plaintiff avers that when he threatened to go on a hunger strike outside the WMATA building to protest this treatment, WMATA and its employees attempted to have him declared “insane.” Id.

Plaintiff's last day at the WMATA building was December 31, 2001, Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment (“Defs.' Br.”) at 2, though he remained on WMATA's payroll through March 31, 2002, so that he could exhaust his accrued annual leave. See Defs.' Ex. 5 at 6–7. Shortly thereafter, plaintiff contacted a WMATA official and offered to work for WMATA as an independent contractor or consultant. Pl.'s Ex. A ¶ 15. According to plaintiff, two of the individual WMATA defendants intervened and told the WMATA official that plaintiff could not work for WMATA as a consultant, id. ¶ 16, formal notification of which plaintiff received on or about May 7, 2002. Id. ¶ 19. Plaintiff filed a charge of discrimination with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission thereafter, and initiated this lawsuit when he received a right to sue letter. Id. ¶ 20.

II. Legal Standard

All parties have moved for summary judgment under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56. If the submissions to the Court demonstrate that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact, the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Fed.R.Civ.P. 56. A dispute about a material fact is genuine “if the evidence is such that a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the nonmoving party.” Calhoun v. Johnson, 632 F.3d 1259, 1261 (D.C.Cir.2011) (quoting Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986) ). To succeed on its motion, the moving party need not produce evidence to demonstrate the lack of material facts at issue, but may instead merely point to the lack of evidence before the court to support the non-moving party's case. Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 325, 106 S.Ct. 2548, 91 L.Ed.2d 265 (1986).

While a court considering summary judgment must view all of the evidence in the light most favorable to the non-moving party, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U.S. 574, 587, 106 S.Ct. 1348, 89 L.Ed.2d 538 (1986), the non-moving party may not simply make conclusory allegations unsupported by specific evidence. Lujan v. Nat'l Wildlife Fed'n, 497 U.S. 871, 902, 110 S.Ct. 3177, 111 L.Ed.2d 695 (1990). Instead, summary judgment is appropriate where there is no factual basis in the record to support the assertions made by the non-moving party. See Ass'n of Flight Attendants–CWA v. U.S. Dep't of Transp., 564 F.3d 462, 465–66 (D.C.Cir.2009). “A party can defeat summary judgment through factual representations made in a sworn affidavit,” but to do so, the party must “support[ ] his allegations ... with facts in the record ... or provide [ ] direct testimonial evidence.” Amiri v. Securitas Sec. Servs. USA, Inc., 35 F.Supp.2d 41, 45, 2014 WL 1289449, at *2 (D.D.C. Apr. 1, 2014) (quotation marks and internal citation omitted).

III. Analysis

A. Plaintiff's Breach Of Contract Claims Fail Because He Has Offered No Evidence That Defendants Breached the Settlement Agreement

Liberally construing the Complaint because plaintiff was without counsel when he initiated this litigation, Erickson v. Pardus, 551 U.S. 89, 94, 127 S.Ct. 2197, 167 L.Ed.2d 1081 (2007), plaintiff seems to allege that WMATA and the individual defendants breached the Settlement Agreement in three ways: first, by enforcing it before it was presented to the Court as an attachment to a draft Stipulated Order of Dismissal, Compl. ¶¶ 11, 15; second, by refusing to even consider retaining plaintiff as an independent contractor or consultant after he resigned from WMATA, id. ¶ 17, 22; and third, by informing plaintiff's former supervisors and staff not to provide positive employment references and verification on his behalf. Id. ¶ 6. Defendants maintain that the Settlement Agreement is the final, written document resolving plaintiff's prior claims, Defs.' Br. at 10, that it bars plaintiff from working directly for WMATA as an employee, contractor, or consultant, id. at 10–11, and that the neutral references of which plaintiff complains are both required by the Settlement Agreement and consistent with WMATA's established and standard personnel practices. Id. at 10.

“The first step in contract interpretation is determining what a reasonable person in the position of the parties would have thought the disputed language meant.” Malik Corp. v. Tenacity Group, LLC, 961 A.2d 1057, 1060 (D.C.2008). This requires examining the contract as a whole, giving a “reasonable, lawful and effective meaning to all its terms.” Debnam v. Crane Co., 976 A.2d 193, 197 (D.C.2009). Absent ambiguity in the contract's language, or the presence of fraud, duress, or mutual mistake, the written language of the document governs the rights and liabilities of the parties. Abdelrhman v. Ackerman, 76 A.3d 883, 888 (D.C.2013). “An ambiguity exists when, to a reasonably prudent person, the language used in the contract is susceptible of more than one meaning.” Aziken v. District of Columbia, 70 A.3d 213, 219 (D.C.2013). However, “contracts are not rendered ambiguous by the mere fact that the parties do not agree upon their proper construction.” Dyer v. Bilaal, 983 A.2d 349, 355 (D.C.2009).

Plaintiff's assertions that the Settlement Agreement was not effective until the parties presented it to the Court and that WMATA breached it by acting prior to that date are without merit. Settlement agreements are governed by contract law. Duk Hea Oh v. Nat'l Capital Revitalization Corp., 7 A.3d 997, 1013 (D.C.2010). There is no provision in the Settlement Agreement indicating that it would not have effect until the Court formally dismissed the underling litigation and its effective date is therefore the date on which the parties signed it: November 6, 2001. As a result, to the extent plaintiff contends that defendants breached the Settlement Agreement by enforcing the provision...