EEOC-Initiated Litigation - 2022 Edition

© 2022 Seyfarth Shaw LLP EEOC-Initiated Litigation: 2022 Edition | 61 evidentiary basis to support an award of punitive damages. Id . at *7. The EEOC contended that it raised genuine issues of material fact by both direct and circumstantial evidence, which precluded granting Defendant's motion, that Defendant’s shifting positions regarding its treatment of Landry raised credibility issues, and that the actions and inactions of managers supported an award of punitive damages. Id . The Court concluded that the EEOC cited evidence from which a reasonable fact-finder could conclude that it had established a prima facie case of disability discrimination for violation of the ADA because Landry suffered an adverse employment action of not being hired on account of a disability. The Court found that Defendant met its burden to state a legitimate, non-discriminatory reason for failing to hire Landry for the stocker position, i.e ., because Landry had not applied for that position. However, the Court reasoned that Defendant failed to establish any reason for failing to hire Landry for any of the 36 positions for which she was considered, and ultimately not hired for at Wal-Mart. Further, the Court determined that Defendant was not consistent with its reasons for failing to hire Landry, and when an employer offers inconsistent explanations for its employment decision, the jury may infer that the employer's reasons are pretextual. Id . at *29. Accordingly, the Court concluded that genuine disputes of material fact regarding whether Defendant's stated reasons for failing to hire Landry were pretextual. Id . at *30. For these reasons, the Court denied Defendant’s motion for summary judgment. EEOC v. West Meade Place, LLP , 841 F. App'x 962 (6th Cir. 2021) . The EEOC filed an action on behalf of the charging party, Carma Kean, alleging that Defendant discriminated against her on the basis of her disability in violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act (“ADA”) when it terminated her employment. The District Court granted Defendant’s motion for summary judgment. On the EEOC’s appeal, the Sixth Circuit reversed and remanded the District Court’s order. Defendant argued that it was unaware that Kean was disabled and that she was fired for providing a falsified document certifying that she could return to work after initially seeking medical leave. Id . at *2. The District Court had ruled that no reasonable jury could find that Kean met any of the statutory definitions of "disability" under the ADA. Id . Kean was employed as a laundry assistant at Defendant’s facility and suffered from anxiety disorder that manifested in periodic "flare-ups" when she experienced panic attacks. Id . at *3. Kean's flare-ups caused a variety of symptoms, including a racing heart, breathlessness, breaking down and crying, and psoriasis, a skin disorder. Kean thereafter alleged that her co-workers were subjecting her to mistreatment, which caused her anxiety to increase. Kean submitted a note from her doctor to Defendant, requesting that Kean be permitted to miss work due to her condition for one-to-three days per month, and three or four times a year. The next day, Kean asked Defendant’s payroll director about taking FMLA leave, in accordance with the documentation that her doctor had provided. The payroll director informed Kean that she did not qualify for FMLA because she had not been employed at West Meade for 12 full months. While the parties disputed what next occurred, Kean was ultimately terminated from her employment when she failed to produce documentation from her doctor that she was able to return to work. Defendant further asserted that Kean produced falsified doctor’s documents and that was the reason she was terminated. The District Court had concluded that no reasonable jury could find that Kean had a disability as defined by the ADA. On appeal, the EEOC argued that Defendant "regarded Kean as having...an impairment," and thereby falling under the ADA's definition of "disability." Id . at *10. Defendant asserted that Kean's anxiety did not affect her ability to do her work. The Sixth Circuit noted that even if Defendant were able to show Kean had no other limitations in other activities, these facts did not necessarily rebut the notion that it could have "perceived" her "as having an impairment" and fired her because of that perceived limitation, particularly in light of the updated standard under the ADA. Id . at *14. The Sixth Circuit determined that viewed in the light most favorable to the EEOC, the record indicated that Defendant was not only aware that Kean had an impairment that intermittently affected her ability to perform her job, but also that it was related to stress. Id . at *16. The EEOC further argued that a jury could find that Defendant fired Kean because it regarded her as having an impairment and that Defendant’s "falsification-of-documentation rationale" was entirely pretextual. Id . at *17. The Sixth Circuit reasoned that there too many factual disputes for the case to be resolved on the basis of summary judgment. For these reasons, the Sixth Circuit reversed and remanded the District Court’s ruling granting summary judgment to Defendant. EEOC v. Blue Sky Vision, LLC , No. 20-CV-285, 2021 WL 5535848 (W.D. Mich. Nov. 1, 2021). The EEOC filed an action on behalf of the charging party, Randall Jansma, an optometrist, alleging that Defendant discriminated against Jansma on the basis of his disability, a homonymous hemianopsia or blind spot, in violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act (“ADA”). Following discovery, Defendant filed