Schulte v. Potter , 218 F. App'x 703 ( 2007 )

F I L E D
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
UNITED STATES CO URT O F APPEALS
January 26, 2007
FO R TH E TENTH CIRCUIT
Elisabeth A. Shumaker
Clerk of Court
KA REN K. SCHU LTE,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v. No. 05-5209
(D.C. No. 03-CV-361-K(M ))
JOHN E. PO TTER, Postmaster (N.D. Okla.)
General, USPS,
Defendant-Appellee.
OR D ER AND JUDGM ENT *
Before H E N RY, A ND ER SO N, and M cCO NNELL, Circuit Judges.
After a bench trial in this age discrimination suit, the district court entered
judgment in favor of defendant John E. Potter, Postmaster General of the United
States Postal Service (USPS or Postal Service). Plaintiff Karen K. Schulte
appeals. W e have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 and affirm.
*
After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel has determined
unanimously to grant the parties’ request for a decision on the briefs without oral
argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(f); 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). The case is therefore
ordered submitted without oral argument. This order and judgment is not binding
precedent, except under the doctrines of law of the case, res judicata, and
collateral estoppel. It may be cited, however, for its persuasive value consistent
with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1 and 10th Cir. R. 32.1.
Background 1
Schulte was born on June 9, 1941, and has worked for the USPS since
1994, primarily as a rural route carrier. According to her testimony, she applied
for twenty-five supervisory positions over a thirty-eight month period. Three of
those positions are particularly relevant to our discussion. In July 2000, when
Schulte was fifty-nine, she applied for a promotion to a supervisory position
through the Postal Service’s Associate Supervisor Program (ASP). In the ASP
selection process, a committee of postal officials reviews applications in which
the identity, age, and certain other identifying characteristics of the applicants are
redacted. In addition, the application contains a section referred to as
“Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities,” or “KSA s,” in which applicants provide
narrative responses concerning their achievements in six different areas such as
leadership and decision making. Applicants whose KSA answers the committee
deems adequate move on to an interview.
The position for which Schulte applied in 2000 was in processing and
distribution, involving work on the “plant” side of the USPS, which concerns the
behind-the-scenes movement of the mail. Schulte’s KSAs were deemed adequate
and she was interviewed, but she was not selected for the position. She initiated a
claim of gender discrimination through the Postal Service’s Equal Employment
1
The background facts are drawn largely from the district court’s written
findings of fact and conclusions of law.
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Opportunity (EEO) process. The parties entered into a settlement agreement by
which the Postal Service offered Schulte a temporary supervisory position (204-B
position) in early 2001. Her tenure in that position ended in November 2001, and
she returned to working as a rural route carrier.
In M arch 2002, Schulte, who was then sixty years old, applied for another
ASP position, this time in customer service. An entirely different committee
composed of Susan Beck, the postmaster of Tulsa, George Frame, the postmaster
of Oklahoma City, Elizabeth Inman, then postmaster of M uskogee, and Jacqueline
Bouffard, then manager of training, conducted the hiring process. Schulte was
notified in June 2002 that she was not selected for an interview because her KSA
answ ers were deficient, in particular her decision-making KSA.
M eanwhile, on M arch 5, 2002, Schulte w as accused of recirculating mail
during a mail count at the Chimney Hills Postal Station in Tulsa, Oklahoma. To
understand this accusation, some background is necessary. The pay of a rural
route carrier such as Schulte is based in part on how much mail she delivers. To
make that determination, the USPS periodically counts the actual number of
pieces of mail that are distributed, or “thrown,” to a carrier’s route, or “scheme.”
M ail that is thrown to the wrong scheme is referred to as a “misthrow.” W hen a
carrier finds a misthrow in her “case,” she is supposed to bring it to the
“misthrow case” for redistribution by the clerks through the “hot case.” During a
mail count, a carrier is supposed to inform the person counting the mail if they
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receive a misthrow that was counted. But if, as alleged here, a carrier places into
the misthrow case properly sorted mail that has already been counted and does not
tell the counter, it would be counted again w hen it is throw n back to that carrier’s
scheme, thereby inflating the number of pieces of mail that are counted and
increasing her annual salary. Fifteen or sixteen extra pieces of mail can inflate an
annual salary by as much as $1,600.
W ith this understanding w e may turn to the events of M arch 5, 2002. On
that day, Pam Cameron, a U SPS clerk who had developed familiarity with
Schulte’s scheme over a twenty-year period, was sorting mail to the carriers at
Chimney Hills. Cameron noticed that some misthrow s were coming through more
than once, even after she had paid particular attention to sorting the mail to the
correct scheme through the hot case. She marked those pieces with a small “x”
and sorted them to the correct route only to have them come back again through
the misthrow case. Cameron observed Schulte return the marked mail to the
misthrow case at least once and concluded that Schulte must be taking it from the
hot case and placing it in the misthrow case.
Cameron brought this to the attention of Schulte’s supervisor, Lila
Lawrence. Lawrence confronted Schulte with the marked mail and informed her
of the nature of the accusation. Schulte acknowledged that some of the marked
mail (approximately thirteen pieces) belonged to her scheme but denied the
charge. Lawrence excluded several pieces of mail Schulte claimed did not belong
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to her scheme and conducted an investigation, after which she submitted a report
to a USPS labor relations specialist, Jeffrey Dalton, recommending termination.
Schulte filed a union grievance that went to arbitration, and Dalton represented
the USPS. The arbitrator found that Schulte had recirculated mail but imposed a
tw enty-two month unpaid suspension rather than termination.
Schulte also filed an EEO complaint of discrimination with the Postal
Service. Initially she alleged only retaliation for an earlier EEO filing, not age
discrimination. She later amended her EEO complaint to include a claim of age
discrimination. Obtaining no relief, Schulte filed the action underlying this
appeal. Some of her claims were dismissed during pretrial proceedings, including
her claim that the denial of her 2000 ASP application and her removal from the
204-B position were because of her age and in violation of the Age
Discrimination in Employment Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 621-634 (ADEA). Two of her
other ADEA claims, those based on the proposed termination and resultant
discipline for recirculating mail and on the denial of her 2002 ASP application,
proceeded to a four-day bench trial. After trial, the district court issued thirty-one
pages of detailed findings of fact and conclusions of law and entered judgment in
favor of the USPS on both of Schulte’s claims. This appeal followed.
Analysis
Schulte’s statement of the issues presented on appeal is somewhat unclear.
As we see it, she raises three issues: (1) the district court erred in denying one of
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her discovery motions; (2) the district court erred by excluding certain evidence at
trial; and (3) the district court did not properly consider certain evidence at trial.
W e address each point in turn.
1. Discovery error
Schulte propounded two requests for the production of documents that are
at issue, Request Nos. 44 and 45, that in essence demanded the production of
documents showing the makeup of the USPS workforce according to age for the
previous ten years both nationally and in the Oklahoma and/or Tulsa region. See
Aplt. App., Vol. I at 306. The USPS objected on overbreadth and relevance
grounds and also claimed that it did not have any responsive documents and
would have to write and install a new computer program to extract the
information from its computerized databases. Schulte filed a motion to compel,
which was her second in the case (Second M otion to Compel). A magistrate
judge held a hearing and, on July 2, 2004, issued a written order denying the
motion because there were “no responsive documents in existence,” and stating
that he would not require the USPS to create reports based on “statistics
concerning the age of Defendant’s work force.” Id. at 230. In reaching his
decision on the merits, the magistrate judge excused Schulte’s counsel’s “failure
to confer in good faith” prior to filing the m otion, a requirement under the court’s
local rule, LCvR 37.1. Id. at 226-27.
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Schulte did not file any objections to the magistrate judge’s order with the
district court. Instead, on September 29, 2004, less than three months before the
scheduled trial date, she filed a motion styled as a motion to reopen discovery and
strike all scheduled dates. The motion was based on allegedly newfound
“evidence that calls into question the veracity of the discovery answers of
Defendant USPS . . . concerning the availability of . . . statistical data [of its
promotion practices].” Id. at 231. The new evidence was an affidavit from a
USPS employee, Gus Reinolds, who claimed to be familiar with USPS computer
systems and who averred that those systems contained data about the age of
promoted employees. In the motion, Schulte asked the district court to “reopen
discovery for the limited purpose of pursuing the statistical data the availability
of which she has apparently been misinformed by Defendant USPS.” Id. at 233.
The magistrate judge held a hearing at which Schulte presented two
witnesses, Reinolds and F. Bennett Callicoat, an attorney with computer database
experience who testified that databases ordinarily can be queried quickly and
easily, without writing a new program, in order to extract information of the type
Schulte sought, namely, the age of employees when they were promoted.
Callicoat, however, had no first-hand knowledge of the USPS’s databases.
The magistrate judge treated the motion as one to compel rather than one to
reopen discovery and denied it on two alternate grounds, the first being Schulte’s
counsel’s failure to comply with the meet-and-confer requirements of Fed. R. Civ.
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P. 37(a)(2)(B) 2 and LCvR 37.1. 3 In reaching this decision, the magistrate judge
specifically noted that it was not the first time Schulte’s counsel had failed to
comply with these rules, Aplt. App., Vol. I at 304, 4 and he rejected the futility
argument Schulte’s counsel had presented at the hearing because LCvR 37.1 did
not list futility as an exception, id. at 305.
2
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37(a)(2)(B) requires any motion to compel
discovery to “include a certification that the movant has in good faith conferred
or attempted to confer with the person or party failing to make the discovery in an
effort to secure the information or material w ithout court action.”
3
At the time of the magistrate judge’s decision in November 2004,
LCvR 37.1A . provided as follow s:
Regarding all motions relating to discovery pursuant to Rules 26
through 37, Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, the court will refuse to
hear any such motion, unless counsel for movant first advises the
court in writing that the lawyers have personally met and conferred
in good faith, but that, after a sincere attempt to resolve differences
has been made, they have been unable to reach an accord. However,
no personal conference shall be required where the movant’s counsel
represents to the court in writing that counsel have conferred by
telephone and the distance between counsels’ offices renders a
personal conference not feasible. An exchange of correspondence
alone does not satisfy this requirement.
See Aplee. Supp. App. at 81. The rule also listed two exceptions not relevant
here. The rule was amended as of M arch 2, 2005, but we apply the rule in effect
at the time the magistrate judge rendered his decision. See United States v.
51 Pieces of Real Property, 17 F.3d 1306, 1310 n.6 (10th Cir. 1994) (applying
procedural rule in effect at time of relevant event in district court rather than
amended version).
4
The magistrate judge also noted that Schulte had failed to comply with
LCvR 7.1E, which extends the meet-and-confer requirement to all nondispositive
motions. However, it does not appear the magistrate judge’s first basis for
denying Schulte’s motion was grounded in that rule, so we need not consider it.
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Alternately, the magistrate judge denied Schulte’s motion on the merits.
He compared the language of the written requests seeking documents pertaining
to “the makeup of the U SPS’s workforce according to age” with Schulte’s
contention that she was seeking “statistical data of [USPS] promotion practices,”
id. at 307, and concluded that Schulte’s “current motion seeks to rewrite Requests
44 and 45 to obtain information that was not previously requested,” id. at 309.
The magistrate judge declined to “accept a broad construction of [Schulte’s]
inartfully drafted discovery requests,” noting that she had “more than adequate
time to develop her case, but has not been diligent in doing so. She has
repeatedly failed to follow Court rules, has not properly sought discovery of the
information she now seeks, and has offered only speculation that the information
she now seeks would assist her case.” Id. at 310. The magistrate judge also
stated that Reinolds’s affidavit presented no new information because the court,
in its ruling on Schulte’s Second M otion to Compel, had previously
acknowledged the existence of “age-related data, but ruled that it would not
require [the USPS] to create reports to respond to Request Nos. 44 and 45.” Id.
at 309. Schulte filed a motion asking the district court to review the magistrate
judge’s order, which the district court denied.
As an initial matter, we conclude that the magistrate judge properly treated
the motion as one to compel rather than one to reopen discovery. The relief
Schulte requested was a court order directing the USPS to produce the requested
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reports on the grounds that it was easy to do and would not require writing a new
computer program. Indeed, in this court, despite claiming that her motion was not
one to compel, Schulte states that at the hearing before the magistrate judge, she
“argued that . . . production should be compelled” for these very reasons. Aplt.
Opening Br. at 53 (emphasis added). Accordingly, the meet-and-confer
requirement of both Fed. R. Civ. P. 37(a)(2)(B) and LCvR 37.1 applied.
W e review the denial of a motion to compel for abuse of discretion. Norton
v. City of M arietta, 432 F.3d 1145, 1156 (10th Cir. 2005) (per curiam). “Under
this standard, we w ill not disturb a trial court’s decision absent a definite and firm
conviction that the lower court made a clear error of judgment or exceeded the
bounds of permissible choice in the circumstances.” Id. (quotation omitted). W e
review a district court’s application of its local rules for abuse of discretion. See
Hernandez v. George, 793 F.2d 264, 266 (10th Cir. 1986).
To reiterate, the magistrate judge denied Schulte’s motion to compel
because futility was not a listed exception to the meet-and-confer requirement of
LCvR 37.1. Schulte argues that futility is an appropriate exception and cites to
one district court opinion, In re Sulfuric Acid Antitrust Litigation, 231 F.R.D.
351, 356 (N.D. Ill. 2005), that acknowledged that the futility doctrine was
applicable to meet-and-confer requirements of the local rule.
Assuming that the futility doctrine is applicable, a matter we need not
decide, we conclude that compliance with the meet-and-confer requirement would
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not have been futile in this instance. Schulte’s motion was based on allegedly
new information, the Reinolds affidavit, and she supported her motion with
Callicoat’s testimony. The magistrate judge could not understand how Schulte
could be simply “rehashing” the same discovery request (and thus claiming
futility) when she had information of w hich the U SPS allegedly was unaw are
concerning the ease with which the requested information could be drawn from
USPS databases. Aplt. App., Vol. I at 240:5-8. W e agree. Had Schulte presented
this information to opposing counsel prior to filing her motion, the USPS may
have reconsidered its position or argued that Schulte’s new information was
erroneous, either of w hich in turn may have avoided the need for court
intervention and fulfilled the purpose of the meet-and-confer requirement.
Futility therefore was not an appropriate reason for noncompliance. The
magistrate judge’s order denying the motion to compel on the ground that Schulte
did not comply with the meet-and-confer requirement was not an abuse of
discretion, particularly in view of the fact that the magistrate judge previously
had excused Schulte’s failure to comply with the requirement in connection with
her Second M otion to Compel and the magistrate judge’s reference to Schulte’s
repeated failure to follow court rules and lack of diligence in developing her case.
Accordingly, we affirm the magistrate judge’s order on this basis and need not
address the alternate basis on which the magistrate judge relied.
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2. Exclusion of evidence
Schulte contends that the district court wrongly excluded evidence from
Steve Lundak, who was the station manager at the Chimney Hills Postal Station at
the time she w orked the temporary 204-B position. “W e review a district court’s
exclusion of evidence for an abuse of discretion.” Cartier v. Jackson, 59 F.3d
1046, 1048 (10th Cir. 1995).
At trial, Schulte’s attorney asked Lundak if he knew what factors typically
cause the termination of a 204-B position. The district court sustained an
objection by the USPS because Schulte’s claim as to that job action had been
dismissed. Schulte’s counsel then made an offer of proof, stating that Lundak’s
testimony would show that he did not want Schulte removed because she did a
good job for him but that “he had to have that happen,” and that his evaluation of
her work performance in her 204-B position was relevant to her performance just
a few months later in connection with the allegation that she had recirculated the
mail. Aplt. App., Vol. II at 546:22 to 547:7. The court noted that counsel had
just asked Lundak about his view of her performance, which he had answered,
repeated that the objection would be sustained, see id. at 547:8-12, and sustained
further objections as counsel continued to question Lundak about the termination
of Schulte’s 204-B position, see id. at 547:14 to 550:4.
Schulte now claims that Lundak’s testimony would have revealed the role
that Susan Beck, postmaster of Tulsa, played in the decision to remove Schulte
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from her 204-B position, which would have put “into a very different light”
Beck’s role in Schulte’s discipline and the denial of her 2002 ASP application.
Aplt. Opening Br. at 29-30. This theory differs from the offer of proof counsel
made at trial, which concerned only Lundak’s opinion of Schulte’s performance
and the fact that he did not want her removed. W e ordinarily do not consider new
theories on appeal, even one “that falls under the same general category as an
argument presented at trial or . . . a theory that was discussed in a vague and
ambiguous way.” Bancamerica Comm’l Corp. v. M osher Steel of Kan., Inc.,
100 F.3d 792, 798-99 (10th Cir.) (quotation omitted), opinion amended on other
grounds, 103 F.3d 80 (10th Cir. 1996). But even considering Schulte’s argument,
it fails because Schulte has made no showing that Beck’s role in Schulte’s
removal from her 204-B supervisory position was motivated by age bias.
Lundak’s testimony, therefore, if indeed it would have encompassed Beck’s role
in that removal, as Schulte argues on appeal, would have been irrelevant to
whether any role Beck might have played in either of the later employment
actions was motivated by age bias. W e therefore conclude that the district court
did not abuse its discretion when it refused to permit Lundak to testify about
Schulte’s removal from her 204-B position.
3. The district court’s consideration of the evidence
The bulk of Schulte’s appellate argument concerns her view that the district
court overlooked or mischaracterized certain evidence presented at trial. She
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suggests that properly construed, the evidence is so overwhelmingly in her favor
that this court should enter judgment in her favor. 5 To the extent Schulte
challenges the district court’s findings of fact, we review for clear error, giving
due regard to the trial court’s opportunity to judge the credibility of the witnesses.
See Fed. R. Civ. P. 52(a). “[T]he question for this court under Rule 52(a) is not
whether it would have made the findings the trial court did, but whether on the
entire evidence [we are] left with the definite and firm conviction that a mistake
has been committed.” N.L.R.B. v. Viola Indus.-Elevator Div., Inc., 979 F.2d
1384, 1387 (10th Cir. 1992) (quotations and alteration omitted) (en banc).
“W here there are two permissible views of the evidence, the factfinder’s choice
between them cannot be clearly erroneous.” Anderson v. City of Bessemer City,
470 U.S. 564, 574 (1985). Further, it is not our function “to infer material facts.”
Transport Equip. Co. v. Guaranty State Bank, 518 F.2d 377, 383 (10th Cir. 1975).
5
The Postal Service argues that by failing to move for judgment as a matter
of law under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 50 in the district court, Schulte has
waived appellate review of the sufficiency of the evidence insofar as she
repeatedly suggests that this court may enter judgment in her favor because the
evidence weighs so strongly in her favor. Rule 50 by its express language applies
only to jury trials, not bench trials. The applicable rule in bench trials provides
that “[w]hen findings of fact are made in actions tried without a jury, the
sufficiency of the evidence supporting the findings may be later questioned
whether or not in the district court the party raising the question objected to the
findings, moved to amend them, or moved for partial findings.”
Fed. R. Civ. P. 52(b). See also Colonial Penn Ins. v. M arket Planners Ins.
Agency, Inc., 157 F.3d 1032, 1036-37 & nn.2-3 (5th Cir. 1998) (failure to file
post-trial motion after bench trial does not preclude appellate challenge to
sufficiency of the evidence). Accordingly, Schulte’s arguments concerning the
sufficiency of the evidence are not waived.
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And we may not make a controlling inference that the trial court did not make
“and which, if done, would in effect constitute a trial de novo.” Id.Schulte’s contention that the court overlooked evidence is based in large
part on the fact that the district court stated a number of times in its decision that
she had presented “no evidence” (or some variant of that phrase) on a certain
point. See, e.g., Aplt. App., Vol. I at 360, ¶ 32; 364, ¶50; 366, ¶60; 366, ¶62;
373, ¶88; 377, ¶97; 378, ¶104; 380, ¶109; 382, ¶114. Schulte concludes that these
types of statements mean that the district court based its ruling only on her failure
to present any direct evidence of discrimination when in fact, according to her,
she presented a large quantity of indirect evidence that supported her claims such
“that judgment may be entered [in her favor] on the strength of the omitted
evidence alone,” Aplt. Opening Br. at 9. To this extent, Schulte in effect
contends that the district court committed a legal error. W e review the district
court’s application of legal standards de novo. Sinajini v. Bd. of Educ., 233 F.3d
1236, 1240 (10th Cir. 2002).
As we proceed to discuss with reference to the district court’s treatment of
the evidence, Schulte’s reading of the court’s use of the phrase “no evidence” and
its variants is flawed. The court’s use of that phrase encompassed direct or
indirect evidence, or both, depending on the context. It is clear that on certain
points Schulte had presented no competent evidence, direct or indirect, while on
others she presented no persuasive evidence either because the witness was not
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credible or less credible than another witness, the testimony was irrelevant,
immaterial, speculative, or nonprobative, or the testimony conflicted with other
testimony that the court considered persuasive. As to still other points, the
district court was not required to discuss particular testimony for reasons we have
explained as follow s:
The exclusion of certain testimony from the findings is not
necessarily an error. In making findings under [Rule 52], a trial
court is not a dictating machine. Its findings do not have to contain
evidence supporting every possible viewpoint. The judge weighs the
evidence and ascertains what the facts are. Nor need the trial court
make findings as to every detail. [Rule 52] does not require the
making of elaborate findings extending into minute and unnecessary
detail on every feature of the case, but is met in full measure if the
findings cover in clear, definite and concise language the contested
issue or issues in the case. Findings of fact are sufficient if they
indicate the factual basis for the court’s general conclusion as to
ultimate facts and are broad enough to cover all material issues.
Nulf v. Int’l Paper Co., 656 F.2d 553, 561 (10th Cir. 1981) (internal citations and
quotation marks omitted). W ith these prefatory remarks in mind, we now turn to
Schulte’s specific arguments concerning witness testimony.
Thomas Stone. Stone testified as an expert witness for Schulte. Schulte
argues that his function was not to establish age discrimination but to establish
that the method used to select a candidate for the 2002 ASP position was
unreliable. Nevertheless, as Schulte acknowledges, Stone discussed the
comparative qualifications of Schulte and Jorge Torrico. Both Schulte and
Torrico had applied for the 2000 and 2002 ASP positions. In 2000, when Schulte
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was fifty-nine and Torrico was thirty-eight years of age, each candidate had
similar KSA scores but Schulte scored higher in the interview process. Neither
was selected. In the 2002 process, each of their KSA answ ers w ere substantially
similar to the answers each gave in 2000, yet Torrico’s scores stayed the same or
went up while Schulte’s score went dramatically down on the KSA concerning
decision-making, which led to her disqualification from consideration. Stone
concluded that the disparity in scores could not be explained by anything other
than age bias. See Aplt. App., Vol. II at 415:24 to 416:1; 424:22 to 425:5.
Stone further discussed documents he review ed, which, according to
Schulte, show that both candidates for the 2000 ASP position over fifty were
eliminated quickly and only one candidate over forty made it past the first stage
of review and even then was rated fifth out of six. Aplt. Opening Br. at 16. 6 And
also according to Schulte, the documentation shows that in 2002, candidates over
forty-six years of age were eliminated in the first round, including Schulte, and
the successful candidates were ranked in reverse order by age (i.e., youngest first,
oldest last). See id.The district court found that Stone’s opinion concerning age bias in the
2002 ASP application process was unsupported because he could not offer any
6
W e note that this summation of the documentary evidence does not appear
to account for Schulte’s selection for an interview for the 2000 ASP position. See
Aplt. App., Vol. IV at 1034 (letter informing Schulte that she was selected for
interview ).
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empirical data that the hiring system w as infected with age bias, could not
exclude other biases, failed to review relevant evidence such as testimony or
statements by the A SP decision-makers or the guidelines they used, was unaw are
that the 2000 ASP position was in the plant side of operations and the 2002 ASP
position was in customer service (ostensibly requiring different skill sets), and
made no allowance for innocent differences of opinion between the 2000 and
2002 ASP committees. Aplt. App., Vol. I at 368-69, ¶ 71-72, 74. The court also
noted several of Stone’s admissions about the deficiencies in his opinion that can
best be summed up by an excerpt from his own testimony: “I don’t have the kind
of evidence I would need for a clear finger that points to age bias. I know there
must have been some kind of bias because the qualifications were so equal yet the
outcome w as so different.” Id., Vol. II at 448:18-21.
W e conclude that the district court’s findings of fact as to Stone are not
clearly erroneous. Contrary to Schulte’s argument, the court did not “shut its
eyes” to the evidence of age bias that Stone presented or the supporting
documentation in the record, Aplt. Opening Br. at 17. The court heard Stone’s
extensive testimony, considered its shortcomings, and found considerable flaw s in
it. Nothing in Stone’s testimony or the documentation required the district court
to find otherwise. Even if we agreed with Schulte that Stone’s testimony
established that the 2002 ASP committee “could” eliminate older workers if it
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wanted to do so because the selection system was flawed, see id. at 42, Stone’s
speculation did not require the district court to find that the committee did so.
In its conclusions of law, the district court noted that Schulte had offered
Stone’s opinion, as well as her own, that she was qualified for the 2002 ASP
position, but concluded that the relevant consideration was the USPS’s perception
of her abilities. See Aplt. App., Vol. I at 379, ¶ 108. Schulte contends that this
was a legal error because the evidence is relevant to the legitimacy of the Postal
Service’s asserted perception under Tyler v. RE/M AX M ountain States, Inc.,
232 F.3d 808 (10th Cir. 2000). As we explained in Tyler, “evidence indicating
that an employer misjudged an employee’s performance or qualifications is, of
course, relevant to the question whether its stated reason is a pretext masking
prohibited discrimination.” Id. at 814 (quotation and brackets omitted). W e
agree therefore that the evidence of Schulte’s qualifications was relevant, but the
district court further stated that even if the committee’s assessment of Schulte’s
qualifications was incorrect, there was no reason to believe that the committee
had acted in bad faith or that their decision was the result of age bias, see Aplt.
App., Vol. I at 380, ¶ 109. Schulte takes issue with that statement, which is a
factual finding although not denominated as such, see Sanchez v. Philip M orris
Inc., 992 F.2d 244, 247 (10th Cir. 1993) (w hether discrimination is intentional is
a factual question), by asserting that “[t]he evidence is overwhelming that the
2002 comm ittee did not act in good faith.” Aplt. Opening Br. at 42. The district
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court disagreed with Schulte’s evaluation of the evidence, and we see no clear
error in that disagreement. As discussed below, the evidence was not
overwhelming that the 2002 committee acted in bad faith.
G us Reinolds. Reinolds had worked in human resources for the USPS in
Tulsa in the early 1980s and later held USPS positions in Texas related to
transportation services and contracts. Although the district court found that he
had no involvement with Schulte’s employment or her 2002 ASP application, see
Aplt. App., Vol. I at 369, ¶¶ 75-76, which implicitly suggests the court found his
testimony to be irrelevant, the two were socially acquainted. Schulte told him
that she was concerned that her nonselection for the 2002 ASP position was due
to age bias. The only portion of Reinolds’s testimony that Schulte references is
the following, which she contends is evidence of the Postal Service’s pattern and
practice of age bias: “M yself personally, . . . at age 59, that’s kind of late to be
putting in for that type of position because if you want to go higher, you’ve got to
put some time into those positions. . . . [I]f I’ve got 30 applicants, I’d say younger
versus older.” Id., Vol. II at 465:11-18. The district court sustained a relevancy
objection to that testimony. Id. at 465:22.
W hile pattern or practice evidence may be relevant to a disparate treatment
case, the evidence must relate to the employer’s practice. See Coe v. Yellow
Freight Sys., Inc., 646 F.2d 444, 449 (10th Cir. 1981). Contrary to Schulte’s
argument, the preface to Reinolds’s statement, “[m]yself personally,” Aplt. A pp.,
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Vol. II at 465:11, clearly indicates that regardless of w hether or not his past work
experience was in a managerial capacity, as Schulte contends, he was providing
his own view s, not those of the Postal Service. The district court did not err in
determining that Reinolds’s statement was irrelevant.
Paula Quinn. Quinn worked with Pam Cameron sorting mail at the
Chimney Hills Postal Station. Her testimony primarily concerned innocent ways
mail could be recirculated and Cameron’s work ethic and sorting accuracy. The
district court discounted Quinn’s testimony because she could not remember if
she w as present on the day Schulte allegedly recirculated the mail and because
her description of scenarios in which there could be continued errors in
recognizing a scheme did not exist on the date in question and could not apply
where “Schulte acknowledged, on sight, that the mail in question belonged to her
route.” Id., Vol. I at 362, ¶ 41. W e see no clear error in the district court’s
treatment of Quinn’s testimony as it relates to Cameron.
Lynn Jones. Jones, who worked as a postmaster for twenty years in
several Oklahoma communities and was retired at the time of trial, testified that
she had been discriminated against in a number of w ays because of her age. In
particular, she stated that younger postmasters were able to secure various
supervisory assignments while she was not, and that after she turned fifty, her
requests for support staff and funding went unfulfilled while younger
postmasters’ staffing requests were fulfilled and she experienced budget cuts.
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The district court determined that her ambiguous testimony failed to exclude
nondiscriminatory explanations and also was irrelevant because there were no
decision-makers common to, and no similarity between, the adverse employment
actions Jones alleged were due to age bias and Schulte’s nonselection for the
2002 ASP position. See id. at 369-70, ¶¶ 77-79; 381, ¶ 114.
Schulte argues that the district court overlooked Jones’s testimony and that
the testimony was relevant. W e disagree. Contrary to Schulte’s argument, the
district court did not overlook Jones’s testimony— the court expressly discussed
it, although perhaps not in as much detail as Schulte would have liked. See id.
And while Jones’s testimony may have been relevant despite the fact that there
were no common decision makers, it was of little persuasive value. In
M endelsohn v. Sprint/United M gmt. Co., 466 F.3d 1223 (10th Cir. 2006), we
declined to extend the “same supervisor” requirement to contexts other than those
involving discriminatory discipline, in particular to a case where a plaintiff claims
to be a victim of a company-w ide discriminatory reduction in force. See id.
at 1226-28. This reasoning applies equally to a failure to promote claim. An
inference that an employer maintains a broad discriminatory policy can be draw n
from evidence that an employer refused to promote other employees w ho are in
the same protected class as the plaintiff. Such evidence therefore may be relevant
to the plaintiff’s individual claim that a particular failure to promote is
discriminatory regardless of whether the same decision makers w ere involved in
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the various decisions. On that score, the district court properly admitted Jones’s
testimony over objection. But when testimony like Jones’s is, as the district court
concluded, “so ambiguous as to wholly fail to eliminate nondiscriminatory
explanations for any disparate treatment she may have observed,” Aplt. A pp.,
Vol. I at 382, ¶ 114, it would be unreasonable to draw an inference that the
employer maintains a broad discriminatory policy, particularly when the employer
is as large as the Postal Service and the plaintiff presents only one witness
complaining of allegedly similar treatment. Accordingly, Jones’s testimony,
although marginally relevant, was not persuasive evidence in support of Schulte’s
claims, and we see no clear error in the district court’s conclusion.
Steve Lundak. Schulte asserts that the district court failed to consider
certain “critical facts in its deliberations.” Aplt. Opening Br. at 21. The first of
these purportedly critical facts is the relative length of time Lundak and Law rence
had supervised her. Schulte contends that because Lundak supervised her for a
much longer period (seven years) than Law rence (three months), the district court
erred in not weighing Lundak’s positive assessment of her performance for him
against the negative assessment Lawrence provided in an evaluation related to
Schulte’s 2002 ASP application. W e disagree. Lundak’s testimony about
Schulte’s job performance and the length of time he had supervised Schulte w ere
of little probative value in deciding whether Lawrence’s own evaluation of
Schulte’s performance was genuine or motivated by an improper factor.
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Schulte also notes the discrepancy between Lundak’s testimony that there
were a small number of employees who were over fifty when they were promoted
to a supervisory position and her own testimony that none of those employees
were over fifty. She then criticizes the Postal Service for not producing any
employees over the age of fifty who were promoted. Schulte has provided no
legal authority for the proposition implied in her argument— that the Postal
Service w as required to identify employees over the age of fifty who were
promoted in order to prevail at trial— and we have found none. W hether or not
Lundak’s testimony concerning the age of promoted employees w as incorrect,
therefore, concerns a detail that is of little import in the overall analysis of the
evidence, and the district court had no reason to discuss it.
Schulte further takes issue with the district court’s treatment of a comment
she alleges Lundak made to her in February 2002, that there are no 204-B
temporary supervisors over the age of fifty nor are such persons entered into ASP
training. See Aplt. App., Vol. II at 621:1-3. Lundak testified that he had never
made any such age-related comment to Schulte. See id. at 551:22. The court
found that Schulte failed to establish any nexus between the alleged comments
and the 2002 ASP selection process, in particular because Lundak did not know
the identity of any of the members of the 2002 ASP committee. Id., Vol. I at 367,
¶ 66. Schulte offers only her own view that Lundak offered his alleged comments
in order to advise her “of the postal pattern and practice of refusing promotion to
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its older workers.” Aplt. Reply Br. at 9. W e agree with the district court that if
Lundak made the alleged comment, Schulte failed to establish any nexus between
it and her nonselection for the 2002 ASP position.
The court further stated that Schulte’s initial EEO claim of discrimination,
filed three months after Lundak’s alleged comment, was “wholly inconsistent
with her testimony about Lundak’s statements” because she did not assert age
discrimination as a basis for her claim until later. A plt. A pp., Vol. I at 367, ¶ 65.
This was a proper inference for the district court to draw, albeit one of minimal
importance.
Jeffrey D alton. Dalton, the U SPS investigator, testified that when he first
received Lawrence’s report recommending that Schulte be removed for
recirculating the mail, his opinion was that the report did not support removal.
He sent a fax to O.D. Curry, a USPS labor relations specialist, to this effect. See
id., Vol. IV at 1063. Dalton further testified that after receiving copies of the
allegedly recirculated mail and interviewing witnesses, he agreed that removal
was proper. Schulte, however, contends that Dalton initially received copies of
the marked mail because the report Law rence sent indicated that the letters w ere
attached and Lawrence testified to that effect at trial. By this assertion, Schulte
apparently would have us conclude that Dalton’s original opinion— that removal
was not warranted— was based on all the evidence and his later, contrary position
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is the sort of inconsistency that undermines the Postal Service’s asserted
nondiscriminatory reason for disciplining her.
The district court’s resolution of these two plausible versions of events
cannot be clearly erroneous. See Anderson, 470 U.S. at 574. Contrary to
Schulte’s contention that the district court “glossed over this evidence merely
because it did not contain a direct admission of age discrimination,” A plt.
Opening Br. at 22, the district court found that Dalton did not receive copies of
the mail until later in his investigation, and that receipt of those letters eliminated
innocent explanations. Aplt. App., Vol. I at 361, ¶ 35. In reaching this finding,
the court also considered Curry’s corroborating testimony that early on, he and
Dalton did not have copies of the letters. See id., ¶ 36. M oreover, the district
court acknowledged Dalton’s testimony that he needed more particular
information from witnesses, not just copies of the mail pieces, see id., ¶ 35, which
undermines Schulte’s theory that his initial opinion represented his true opinion
of the case simply because he already had seen the mail pieces.
Lila Law rence. Schulte notes contradictions in the witness statements
Lawrence obtained from other Postal Service employees in connection with her
investigation, such as who had marked the mail and whether the mail was marked
with an “x” or either an “x” or a checkmark. Schulte concludes that the
statements formed an unreliable basis for Lawrence’s conclusion that Schulte had
recirculated mail, which apparently suggests that the Postal Service’s explanation
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for why it disciplined Schulte w as implausible. Schulte also points to Law rence’s
testimony that she did not include in the report she sent to D alton a witness
statement from Quinn that was beneficial to Schulte. W hile these points might
support a finding that the investigation was imperfect, they are too minor to show
that Lawrence’s belief that Schulte had recirculated mail w as not genuine. See
Pastran v. K-M art Corp., 210 F.3d 1201, 1206 (10th Cir. 2000) (inquiry is not
whether employer was right to think an employee engaged in misconduct but
whether the belief was genuine).
Lawrence also testified that she had actually seen Schulte recirculate mail.
Schulte asserts that this was the first time Lawrence had ever mentioned this,
implying that Lawrence fabricated the statement. Even if Schulte is correct, the
alleged fabrication does not exclusively suggest age bias such that we might see
clear error in the trial court’s conclusion that Lawrence had a good-faith belief
that Schulte had recirculated the mail, see Aplt. A pp., Vol. I at 373, ¶ 88.
Schulte’s final contention, that the failure to inquire into whether or not the
recirculated mail w ould have actually increased her salary, appears irrelevant.
Lawrence’s testimony suggests that the mere attempt would have been a sufficient
basis for termination because it “could inflate her count.” See id., Vol. II
at 751:11.
G eorge Frame and Susan Beck. As noted, Frame and Beck, postmasters
of Oklahoma City and Tulsa, respectively, were members of the 2002 ASP
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comm ittee. The district court found that Schulte “presented no evidence that any
comm ittee member in the 2002 ASP application review process calculated or
estimated M s. Schulte’s age or the age of any other applicant.” Id., Vol. I at 364,
¶ 50. Schulte takes issue with Beck’s claim that she did not identify Schulte from
the redacted application form submitted for the 2002 ASP position, comparing it
with the testimony of Lynn Jones that, while Jones w as a postmaster, all
promotion applications came to her unredacted. To the extent Jones’s testimony
suggests that as a general matter postmasters always receive unredacted
application forms and therefore Beck must have, it supports one of two plausible
findings, and the district court’s choice between them cannot be clearly
erroneous. See Anderson, 470 U.S. at 574.
Schulte also places much stock in the purportedly conflicting explanations
she received concerning why her answer to the decision-making KSA led to her
nonselection for the 2002 ASP position. She claims that she was told both that
she did not describe making a decision at all and that she described making a
decision that she did not have the authority to make. She compares this with the
2000 ASP committee’s approval of the substantially same answer she submitted
then and concludes that the reason for her nonselection in 2002 was a fabrication.
See Aplt. Opening Br. at 49-50.
Again, evidence that an employer misjudged an employee’s qualifications
is relevant to whether its stated reason is a mask for prohibited discrimination.
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See Tyler, 232 F.3d at 814. But as the district court found, different committees
and committee members could reach different results concerning qualifications.
See Aplt. App., Vol. I at 365-66, ¶¶ 59-60. We agree even if, as Schulte
contends, her authority to make the decision she described in her KSA presented a
factual question that each committee should have answered in the same way.
Inconsistencies that may be attributable to differences in employer representatives
or human error are of insufficient probative value to render the district court’s
findings in this case clearly erroneous.
Schulte further contends that she was given conflicting answers about the
number of KSAs on which she failed to demonstrate adequate achievement. See
Aplt. Opening Br. at 30-31. The record, however, does not unequivocally support
this contention. Two letters written by Gwen O’Brien showed that she had not
demonstrated proficiency in five of the KSAs. Aplt. A pp., Vol. IV at 1073, 1075.
A later email from Jackie Bouffard, one of the 2002 ASP committee members,
discussed only one of the KSAs because, as Bouffard wrote, the failure to
demonstrate one KSA required no further evaluation. See id. at 1077. That em ail
does not indicate whether Schulte’s answers to the other KSA s were deficient or
not. The perceived “conflict” among these letters therefore is minimal at best,
and the district court was not required to address it.
Jackie Bouffard. Bouffard testified that the 2002 ASP committee worked
to build consensus about each applicant’s answers to the KSA s. Schulte argues
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that Bouffard’s testimony tended to support that there was undue influence on the
comm ittee and that the district court ignored that testimony. Again, the district
court found that each testifying board member stated that no undue influence
occurred. Id., Vol. I at 364, ¶ 50. Schulte’s reading of Bouffard’s testimony as
suggesting otherwise is contrary to the record. Bouffard did not recall anyone
talking about the age of the applicants, particularly as might be gleaned from the
listed dates of high school graduation on the redacted application form. See id.,
Vol. III at 893:15-22. She further stated that “[a]ge has no bearing on these
applications” and is “not necessarily something you discuss.” Id. at 894:1-5.
W hen asked if she would change her evaluation about the answer to a particular
KSA if another committee member brought up the applicant’s age, Bouffard
stated that she looks at “what’s written. You’re not looking at those other
factors.” Id. at 899:5-9. She further testified that she would be unable to know if
another committee member had a bad motive if it w as not communicated to her.
Id. at 899:20 to 900:3. Nothing in her testimony suggests that the district court’s
factual finding was clearly erroneous.
O .D. Curry. Schulte contends that Curry’s testimony shows that another
Postal Service employee who also was accused of recirculating mail during the
M arch 2002 mail count, Sherry Birt, was not treated similarly to Schulte because
Birt was offered a settlement and Schulte allegedly was not. This contention
overlooks the district court’s primary reason for rejecting it— that the only
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evidence of Birt’s age was Schulte’s own assessment. See id., Vol. I at 376, ¶ 95;
see also id., Vol. II at 666:12-13 (Schulte’s testimony that Birt was “a number of
years younger than” her). N o reasonable inference as to Birt’s age may be drawn
from Schulte’s ambiguous testimony. See Sunward Corp. v. Dun & Bradstreet,
Inc., 811 F.2d 511, 521 (10th Cir. 1987) (reasonable inferences must be more than
speculation and conjecture). 7 W e need not address the district court’s alternate
basis for rejecting the Postal Service’s treatment of Birt as a comparator case, that
Schulte did receive the same offer but refused it, and we decline to address the
remainder of Schulte’s arguments concerning Curry’s testimony because they
raise matters of no consequence.
Pam Cameron. Schulte takes issue with a perceived discrepancy between
Cameron’s testimony that she saw Schulte return marked mail to the misthrow
case, which the district court noted in its findings, see Aplt. App., Vol. I at 355,
¶ 12, and the omission of this detail from the contemporaneous witness statement
Cameron had given to Lawrence. W hen asked about this discrepancy, Cameron
testified that she was only required to write a short statement about what
happened, which did not require her to include her observation of Schulte, and
7
Schulte points to the testimony of another witness who was forty-seven at
the time of trial, Randy Robinson. W hen asked if Birt was about his same age,
Robinson replied “I don’t— I guess.” Aplt. App., Vol. III at 866:25 to 867:2. To
the follow up query, “M ore or less?,” he replied, “Uh-huh.” Id. at 867:3-4. Like
Schulte’s testimony, Robinson’s is so ambiguous as to offer no support for her
claim.
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that she wrote a very short statement because she had never dealt with anything
like this in her twenty years with the Postal Service. Id., Vol. III at 978:4-9. This
suggests a credibility issue on which sufficient evidence existed for the district
court to find Cameron credible.
Schulte points to Cameron’s description of other w ays the marked letters
could have been sent through the misthrow case in support of her disagreement
with the district court’s finding that she offered no innocent explanation for the
same mail pieces coming through as misthrows multiple times, see id., Vol. I at
355, ¶ 13. This presents a factual question implicating Cameron’s repeated
testimony that those methods would not account for the same mail being
recirculated multiple times. See id., Vol. III at 966:19-22; 972:23. The district
court apparently resolved that question against Schulte, and we see no clear error.
K aren Schulte. Schulte’s primary discontent with the district court’s
findings as to her testimony is the following: “Schulte admitted at trial that she
has absolutely no evidence of any kind to support her allegation that
M s. Lawrence’s actions in proposing her removal were motivated by age bias.”
Id., Vol. I at 360, ¶ 32. Schulte argues that at most, this admission concerns only
direct evidence, then concludes that the court’s finding indicates its disregard of
indirect evidence. Aplt. Opening Br. at 12. W e see nothing improper about the
district court’s accurate finding as to Schulte’s express agreement that she had not
presented any “incidents” or other “anecdotal evidence” that showed Lawrence
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was motivated by age bias. See Aplt. App., Vol. II at 663:19-22. And as we
noted above, this finding does not indicate that the court was looking for only
direct evidence of discrimination or based its decision exclusively on the absence
of direct evidence.
Schulte further takes issue with the district court’s treatment of evidence
that she applied for and did not receive a number of other supervisory positions,
which the court admitted as pattern or practice evidence. The court noted only
that Schulte admitted she was not qualified for some of the positions for which
she had applied. Id., Vol. I at 368, ¶ 69. She artfully claims that “[t]he Court did
not consider the far more numerous positions which [I] was denied, although [my]
eligibility for them was never challenged.” A plt. Opening Br. at 40. Schulte’s
testimony regarding those other positions does not show that she was qualified for
them. In presenting pattern or practice evidence to bolster her case, the burden
was on her to present evidence from which an inference could be drawn that age
bias was the reason she did not receive any promotions. She only established that
she had applied for a variety of positions and that she was either not contacted
about her application, overlooked for an unspecified reason, or denied for a
nondiscriminatory reason. See, e.g., Aplt. App, Vol. II at 599:16-23; 604:11 to
605:6; 606:9-18. Nothing suggests that she w as qualified for any of those
positions or overlooked or denied because of her age.
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Schulte also offered testimony about Tom M ullins, a USPS human-relations
employee who worked as a mail counter for Schulte’s route in M arch 2002.
According to Schulte, M ullins introduced himself a day or two before the mail
count and asked her about her retirement plans. Id. at 628:4 to 629:9. She further
testified that M ullins took mail pieces to a clerk to inquire whether they belonged
to her scheme and later completed a witness statement accusing her of
recirculating mail. Id. at 629:18 to 630:5. She contends that M ullins’s comm ent
about her retirement was not a stray remark lacking any nexus to the employment
decision, as the district court stated, see id., Vol. I at 358-59, ¶ 28; 374, ¶ 91, but
part of a “mosaic of evidence that, taken together, creates an inference of age
discrimination,” ostensibly under the “cat’s paw” theory of liability, see Aplt.
Reply Br. at 8-9.
As we recently explained, the “cat’s paw” theory of liability (also referred
to as the “rubber stamp” or “subordinate bias” theory) requires “a plaintiff [to]
establish more than mere ‘influence’ or ‘input’ in the decisionmaking process.
Rather, the issue is whether the biased subordinate’s discriminatory reports,
recommendation, or other actions caused the adverse employment action.”
E.E.O.C. v. BCI Coca-Cola Bottling Co., 450 F.3d 476, 487 (10th Cir. 2006),
cert. granted, 75 U.S.L.W . 3106 (U.S. Jan. 5, 2007) (No. 06-341). W e further
explained that “an employer can avoid liability by conducting an independent
investigation of the allegations against an employee.” Id. at 488. Here, assuming
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that M ullins’s remark about Schulte’s retirement plans was evidence of his ow n
age bias, any discriminatory animus he may have had toward Schulte could be a
factor under the cat’s paw theory if it caused Lawrence to recommend
termination. But because there was sufficient evidence to show that Lawrence
conducted an independent investigation, Schulte may not avail herself of the cat’s
paw theory of liability, and M ullins’s alleged comment is irrelevant.
In addition to the foregoing, we have reviewed the remainder of Schulte’s
arguments and find that they either are presented in a conclusory fashion or, like
many of those we have expressly considered, concern immaterial matters even
when considered in the aggregate. W e also have considered the points set forth in
Schulte’s supplemental authority and find them unpersuasive.
The judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED.
Entered for the Court
Stephen H. Anderson
Circuit Judge
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