Joyce K. Dennis v. Columbia Colleton Medical Center, Inc., et al.

Appellant/Cross-Appellee Columbia Colleton Medical Center
("Colleton") employed Appellee/Cross-Appellant Joyce Dennis as an
emergency room registration clerk. In June 1997, Dennis was passed
over for promotion to the position of registration supervisor in favor
of an outside candidate, Johnny Bridge. Dennis brought suit pursuant
to Title VII, 42 U.S.C. S 2000(e), alleging discrimination based on
gender. After a trial in which the jury found in favor of Dennis, Colleton filed motions for judgment as a matter of law and a new trial,
which were denied. Colleton appeals the denial of its post-trial
motions, as well as the district court's award of back pay and assessment of attorney's fees. Dennis cross-appeals the district court's post-
trial reduction of a $25,000 jury award for emotional distress. We
affirm.

I.

In May 1996, Dennis was employed by Colleton as a part-time
emergency room registration clerk. At the time she was hired, Dennis
was a 19-year-old high school graduate who had worked a number of
service jobs and was enrolled in an Emergency Medical Services
("EMS") training course. On January 20, 1997, Dennis transferred to
a full-time position as a technician in the Labor and Delivery Department. On March 30, 1997, Dennis returned to the emergency room as
a full-time registration clerk. For the roughly 15 months that she
worked at the hospital, Dennis was a diligent and hardworking
employee who generally earned positive assessments for her work.

At the time of Dennis' transfer back to the emergency room, man-
agement of the Registration Department was in a state of some disarray. Either during or soon after her return, a new registration
supervisor was hired. The supervisor had difficulty coping with the
position and abruptly resigned on June 15, 1997, leaving the department without a supervisor. During an approximately eight week
period when the department was without a formal supervisor, Dennis
would periodically carry out some supervisory duties, including training new employees and fielding operational questions.

Dennis applied for the position of registration supervisor once it
was formally opened. On June 20, 1997 she interviewed with Jennifer
Wray, the decision-maker normally responsible for filling this position. During the interview, Wray made an inappropriate comment
suggesting that although she would personally like to promote her,
Dennis would not get the promotion due to an affair she was rumored
to be having with a doctor. Dennis denied the affair and complained
to Jimmy Hiott, Colleton's chief financial officer and Wray's direct
superior. After consulting with colleagues in senior management,
Hiott chose to reprimand Wray and take over the selection process
himself.

The process that Hiott applied was peculiarly informal. Hiott
reviewed Dennis' initial application to the hospital, but did not personally interview her. Nor did he inquire into her experience since
joining the hospital or check her references or evaluations. Hiott did
however interview Bridge, a 32-year-old who was at that time working full-time as a transportation and computer manager at Clean Management Environmental Group. Bridge's wife had worked at Colleton
in data processing and was acquainted with Hiott. Bridge himself also
had some extremely limited experience at Colleton working as a parttime "PRN PBX operator," which entailed operating the PBX switchboard system nights and weekends on an "as needed" basis. Because
the PBX was physically near Registration, he also received some registration training and worked a few shifts in Registration on an informal basis. The record is unclear as to whether Bridge formally applied
for the supervisor's position and as to how Hiott became aware that
he would be interested in it.

In addition to Dennis and Bridge, the record also offers disputed
evidence of a third candidate, Tonya Williams, who was then working
at Colleton's business office. Williams, an African-American woman,
had roughly seven years experience working in Registration, a degree
in computer technology and, unlike either Dennis or Bridge, met the
formal requirements for the supervisory position. Hiott claimed that
he was never made aware of Williams' application, and Colleton
offered supporting evidence that it may have been submitted or at
least discovered by the head of human resources after the position
was already filled. However, the date on William's transfer request
form was timely, and the director of human resources testified at
deposition that she had forwarded the application to Wray. Although
she later claimed that this was after the position was already filled,
Wray did know about Williams' interest in the position before Hiott
took over the hiring process because she conducted an interview with
her on the same day that she interviewed Dennis.

In any event, Hiott awarded the position to Bridge. His proffered
explanation was that he selected Bridge for his management and computer skills. Hiott claimed at trial that at the time of the decision he
was aware that Registration needed someone with such skills in order
to reform a badly disorganized department and oversee a planned
change in computer systems. He asserted that he had posed various
hypothetical problems to Bridge during his interview and had been
highly impressed by his answers. Based on this favorable impression
and his prior knowledge of Bridge's affinity for computers, he offered
him the job.

Dennis was not as impressed. After learning of the promotion deci-
sion, she quit her position at Colleton and filed an EEOC charge and
subsequent suit alleging discriminatory failure to promote as well as
defamation. Colleton moved for summary judgment on all causes of
action, and the motion was granted on April 6, 2000. However, Dennis filed a motion for reconsideration on June 23, 2000, based on the
Supreme Court holding in Reeves v. Sanderson Plumbing Products,
Inc., 530 U.S. 133 (2000). On August 14, 2000, the district court
reversed its previous order except as to the defamation charge.

The case was then tried to a jury except the issues of compensatory
front pay and back pay, which the parties agreed to have tried sepa-
rately before the district court judge. After Colleton's motion for
judgment as a matter of law was denied, the jury found in favor of
Dennis on the discrimination claim and awarded $25,000 in compensatory damages for emotional distress. After a separate hearing, the
district court awarded $31,302 in back pay. It also granted
$104,765.80 in attorney's fees and costs.

Following the trial, Colleton filed a renewed motion for judgment
as a matter of law and a motion for a new trial. The district court
denied both motions, but granted a request to nullify the jury's
$25,000 award for emotional distress.

* * *

Colleton first argues that Dennis failed to offer sufficient evidence
to make out a prima facie case of gender discrimination. We begin by
noting that while this argument is couched in terms of the burden
shifting framework of McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S.
792 (1973), that approach is inapposite when a trial has proceeded to
completion. Gibson v. Old Town Trolley Tours of Washington D.C.,
160 F.3d 177, 180 (4th Cir. 1998). At trial, Dennis shed the intermediate burdens of McDonnell Douglas, and faced the ultimate burden
of proving her case. Thus, we treat Colleton's claim on appeal as
alleging that no reasonable jury could have found discrimination in
failing to promote Dennis for the reason that she was plainly unqualified for the job.

* * *

Colleton's primary argument is that the case presented by Dennis
was based solely on prima facie evidence of the candidates' qualifications and evidence tending to disprove Hiott's claimed reasons for
hiring Bridge. Colleton claims that this was insufficient evidence for
a reasonable jury to find discrimination. Again, we disagree.

Under the McDonnell Douglas framework, once an employer has
met its burden of producing a legitimate nondiscriminatory explanation for its decision, the plaintiff is afforded the "opportunity to prove
by a preponderance of the evidence that the legitimate reasons offered
by the defendant were not its true reasons, but were pretext for discrimination." Texas Dept. of Community Affairs v. Burdine, 450 U.S.
248, 253 (1981). That is, Dennis could attempt to establish that she
was the victim of intentional discrimination by "showing that the
employer's proffered explanation is unworthy of credence." Id. at
256. The first thrust of Colleton's argument is that Dennis failed to
make a sufficient showing that Colleton's proffered reason for hiring
Bridge was false.

* * *

Click the case caption above for the full text of the Court's opinion.

For the foregoing reasons, the district court's denial of Colleton's
renewed motion for judgment as a matter of law and motion for a new
trial, as well as its grant of Colleton's motion to amend or alter the
Judgment as to compensatory damages for emotional distress are
affirmed. The district court's grant of Dennis' motion for back pay
and her counsel's motion for attorney's fees are also affirmed.

Unavailable

Unavailable

None