Job bias case to be dismissed
on Apr 11, 2007 at 5:11 pm
UPDATE 10:45 p.m. The Supreme Court will consider this week a potential sequel to the case (discussed below) that is to be dismissed imminently. Thanks to Public Citizen for pointing out that Ray v. CSX Transportation (06-405) is to be considered at the Court’s Conference on Friday. The Court had denied review in the case on Nov. 27, but a rehearing petition was filed, and the Court asked for and received a response to that from CSX. The Fourth Circuit Court opinion discusses the subordinate bias issue only briefly; its opinion can be found at this site, by entering docket number 05-1623; it was decided May 23, 2006.
An employment discrimination case that the Supreme Court had been scheduled to hear on April 18 will be dismissed, lawyers involved have advised the Court. The dismissal of BCI Coca-Cola Bottling v. EEOC (docket 06-341) will be dismissed by agreement; the BCI side will move to dismiss, and the government will not object, it is understood.
The case sought to test employer liability for alleged bias of a subordinate, when the subordinate was not the one who made the actual employment decision at issue. Here is the question as presented: “Under what circumstances is an employer liable under federal anti-discrimination laws based on a subordinate’s discriminatory animus, where the person(s) who actually made the adverse employment decision admittedly harbored no discriminatory motive toward the impacted employee.” The issue has come to be known popularly as the “cat’s paw” theory of liability; it has produced a split among the lower courts.
The Court granted review of the BCI case on Jan. 5, over the opposition of the U.S. Solicitor General, who argued that the case was not a good vehicle to confront the issue because the case “arises in an interlocutory posture (and it is therefore unclear whether resolution of that conflict would affect the outcome of this case).”
If the Court still remains interested in the legal question, as it very likely is, the same issue is pending in Sawicki v. Morgan State University (06-306); available for download here. The Court considered that case on Jan. 5 along with the BCI case. The Sawicki case involves a final judgment — a summary ruling in favor of the employer. In that case, the judgment was based upon Fourth Circuit precedent in 2004 (Hill v. Lockheed Martin Logistics Management). The Hill case itself had gone to the Supreme Court (03-1443), and the Court at that time asked for the Solicitor General’s views on the issue. However, that case was ultimately dismissed in January 2005 by agreement of the parties under the Court’s Rule 46. (UPDATE: See the note at top of this blog on another case now at the Court on the same issue.)
With the dismissal of the BCI case, the Court will have less need for one of the afternoon sittings it had planned for April. BCI was one of three cases scheduled for argument on April 18. The scheduled case for the afternoon, Panetti v. Quarterman (06-6407), a death penalty case, could now be moved to the morning session.
