Williams v. Quality Tech., Inc.

LACHÉ WILLIAMS, Plaintiff, v. QUALITY TECHNOLOGY, INC., d/b/a QUTECH, Defendant.

1:19-cv-106 (LMB/MSN)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF VIRGINIA Alexandria Division

February 18, 2020

MEMORANDUM OPINION

In this civil action brought under the Americans with Disabilities Act ("the ADA"), the Court entered judgment after a bench trial in favor of defendant Quality Technology, Inc. ("QuTech" or "defendant"). Plaintiff Laché Williams' ("Williams" or "plaintiff") has filed a Motion for Further Action After a Non-Jury Trial [Dkt. No. 89], in which she asks the Court to amend its findings of fact, make new conclusions of law, and enter a new judgment under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(a)(2).¹

As discussed below, this motion will be denied for several reasons. First, Rule 59(a)(2) authorizes courts to amend their findings of fact and conclusions of law or enter a new judgment only upon a motion for a new trial, but plaintiff has not specifically moved for a new trial. Second, even if the Court did have the authority to grant the requested relief absent a motion for a new trial, Williams' motion would fail on the merits because it does not demonstrate that thejudgment was against the clear weight of the evidence, was based on evidence which is false or on a manifest error of law or mistake of fact, or will result in a miscarriage of justice.

I. Background

This civil action's lengthy procedural history, which led to the bench trial, will first be discussed.

A. The parties and the complaint

QuTech is an information technology company that works on government contracts. In April 2014,² Williams was hired by QuTech's Falls Church, Virginia office to work as an analyst on QuTech's contract with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services ("the CMS contract"), under which QuTech provided support services relating to the Affordable Care Act ("ACA"). In early September 2015, Williams and other employees were told that they might need to assist with telephone inquiries due to the influx of calls during the ACA open enrollment period, a task that Williams alleges she was not previously required to perform. In her complaint, Williams claimed to have an anxiety disorder, the symptoms of which can be "brought on in the workplace by speaking on the phone." Compl. [Dkt. No. 1] ¶ 15. She informed QuTech of her disorder and stated that she wanted to request an accommodation. After interactions with QuTech managers and employees during which Williams alleges she behaved appropriately, but during which QuTech claims she was insubordinate and unprofessional, QuTech terminated her on September 21, 2015. On January 28, 2019, after exhausting her administrative remedies, Williams filed this action alleging that QuTech discriminated against her based on her anxiety disorder in violation of the ADA (Count I), failed to accommodate her disability (Count II); andretaliated against her (Count III). Williams' complaint sought "[l]ost wages in excess of $75,000 . . . or in an amount to be proven at trial," $200,000 in compensatory damages, $200,000 in punitive damages, attorneys' fees and costs, pre- and post-judgment interest, and any other relief the Court deemed just and proper. Id. at 8.

B. Summary judgment

In September 2019, the parties filed cross motions for summary judgment. QuTech's motion contended that Williams was terminated not because of her disability or request for an accommodation, but rather because of her insubordination, and further argued that summary judgment should be granted in its favor on Counts I and II because Williams was not disabled under the ADA.

The ADA defines disability, in relevant part, as "a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities of [an] individual."³ 42 U.S.C.A. § 12102(1)(A). Williams contended that her anxiety "substantially limits her ability to perform a major life activity because it can cause her to freeze-up making her unable to speak resulting in the inability to communicate and work." [Dkt. No. 42] at 11. The Court granted QuTech's motion for summary judgment on Counts I and II, in part because even viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to Williams, and construing "substantially limits" broadly in favor of expansive coverage, there was insufficient evidence in the summary judgment record from which a reasonable fact finder could conclude that plaintiff suffered from an anxiety disorder which substantially limited one of the referenced major life activities. Among the significant defects inplaintiff's evidence was that the medical records submitted to the court did not support, and even undermined, her own assertions about her limitations. For example, although Williams apparently saw a psychologist, Dr. Spencer Johnson, almost a month after her termination, that doctor's records did not confirm that her anxiety disorder limited her in the specific manner she described. [Dkt. No. 42-3]. The next most recent medical records submitted were from 2009, about six years before her termination, and they did not reflect her specific alleged limitations either. None of Williams' medical records indicated, for example, that her anxiety "can cause her to freeze-up making her unable to speak resulting in the inability to communicate and work." Moreover, although Williams alleged that a traumatic event in 2001 triggered her anxiety about speaking on the phone, [Dkt. No. 45-1] at 134:17-22, her medical records reflected that in 2007, while in another job, Williams sent a message to a medical provider in which she described answering phones as not being stressful. See [Dkt. No. 45-3] at 6 ("I work at the Call Center . . . and I do not do anything stressful at work other than sit at my desk and answer the phone.").

With respect to Williams' failure to accommodate claim, the summary judgment record showed that QuTech had made reasonable efforts to work with Williams to find an accommodation for her, but Williams had failed to participate in the interactive process in good faith. Ruddell v. Triple Canopy, Inc., No. 1:15-cv-1331, 2016 WL 4529951, at *9 (E.D. Va. Aug. 29, 2016) ("[P]laintiff, no less than defendant, has an obligation to engage in the interactive process in good faith."). For example, because the accommodation process "must be truly 'interactive,' an employer is not required to continue the process when the employee cannot identify a reasonable accommodation that would have been possible." Ruddell, 2016 WL 4529951, at *9 (quoting Wilson v. Dollar Gen. Corp., 717 F.3d 337, 347 (4th Cir. 2013)). Although Williams, who had been hired under a job description stating "[c]all center experiencestrongly preferred," [Dkt. No. 45-6], stated in an email to her supervisor that she was unable to assist on the phones, [Dkt. No. 45-11] at 2, the record did not reflect that providing a phone-related accommodation would have been a reasonable accommodation responsive to her alleged impairment. While the complaint stated that Williams' anxiety could be triggered by "speaking on the phone," Compl. ¶ 15, Williams' own deposition testimony suggested that her anxiety could be triggered not simply by having to speak on the phone but by being in a "noisy environment." [Dkt. No. 54-1] at 91:8-11 (testifying that she uses a cell phone on vibrate and that her trigger is "[n]ot a telephone. It's the noisy environment"). Although plaintiff did not submit an affidavit from a medical expert at summary judgment, QuTech submitted both an affidavit and excerpts from the deposition of its expert, Dr. Jeffrey S. Janofsky, who testified that "one would expect, based on my training and experience as a psychiatrist who has reviewed probably hundreds of thousands of pages in records and . . . seen thousands of patients in my career . . . [that there would] be some mention of this [phone-related] issue in prior treatment records, specifically, for the treatment of anxiety if it had occurred as she said. There is none." [Dkt. No. 57-2] at 5-6; see also [Dkt. No. 45-4]. Accordingly, even if Williams had been excused from answering calls altogether, there was insufficient evidence that that accommodation would have alleviated any limitations associated with her anxiety. See Hamel v. Bd. of Educ. of Harford Cty., No. 16-cv-2876, 2018 WL 1453335, at *12 (D. Md. Mar. 23, 2018) ("[A]t a minimum, Plaintiff must show that her requested accommodation is related to her . . . limitations—i.e., it is plausible that had the accommodation been granted it would have alleviated her . . . limitations and allowed her to perform an essential job function or enjoy 'equal benefits and privileges of employment' she otherwise could not.").

Accordingly, the Court granted summary judgment for the defendant on Counts I and II, but allowed the retaliation claim (Count III) alone to proceed to trial, because there were genuine disputed material facts as to that count, and ADA retaliation claims do not require a plaintiff to be disabled under the statute or to have engaged in the interactive accommodation process.

C. Motion to strike

On October 9, 2019, QuTech moved to strike the complaint's request for compensatory and punitive damages and a jury trial, arguing that none of those remedies were available in a standalone ADA retaliation action. That motion was granted based on the reasoning in two unpublished Fourth Circuit opinions and authority from the Seventh and Ninth Circuits concluding that such relief is unavailable for ADA retaliation claimants. See Rhoads v. F.D.I.C., 94 F. App'x 187, 188 (4th Cir. 2004) ("[Plaintiff's] claim that she was entitled to recover compensatory and punitive damages in her trial for violation of the ADA's anti-retaliation provision fails because such relief is unavailable.") (citing Kramer v. Banc of Am. Sec., LLC, 355 F.3d 961, 965 (7th Cir. 2004), cert. denied 542 U.S. 932 (2004)); Bowles v. Carolina Cargo, Inc., 100 F. App'x 889, 890 (4th Cir....