PAULA Y. WILLIAMS, Plаintiff-Appellant, v. OFFICE OF THE CHIEF JUDGE OF COOK COUNTY, ILLINOIS and MICHAEL ROHAN, Defendants-Appellees.
Nos. 15-2325 & 15-2554
United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit
ARGUED APRIL 5, 2016 — DECIDED OCTOBER 11, 2016
Before WOOD, Chief Judge, and BAUER and WILLIAMS, Circuit Judges.
Appeals from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. No. 1:13-cv-1116 — Jorge L. Alonso, Judge.
Williams began working for the Juvenile Probation Department of the Office of the Chief Judge of Cook County (OCJ) in November 1995. OCJ has more than two thousand employees and seven departments, one of which is the Juvenile Division. At the time she was fired, OCJ was run by Michael Rohan, who had the final say in all termination decisions. Starting in 2008, Williams had a series of interactions with the personnel department which she contends caused her termination.
A. Race Discrimination Complaint
In December 2008, Williams, who is African American, reported an incident of racial intimidation by two white co-workers. She wrote a memorandum to Charles Young, the deputy director of the Juvenile Probation Department, stating that one of the co-workers called her over and the other said to her, “When you go black you never go back and when you are white, you are always right.” Williams found this comment to be “venomous.” Two days later, Williams received a memo from Rohan acknowledging receipt of her report, apologizing for the behavior she described, and informing her that he was opening an investigation into the matter. Williams claims that later that month, Rohan approached her at the Probation Department‘s holiday party, and instructed her not to mention her memorandum to anyone outside of the building. Rohan does not recall such a conversation.
Eventually (the timing is disputed), the co-workers were interviewed, denied that their remarks were racially motivated, and were counseled not to make such remarks again. Over a year after the investigation was finished, Young created a memorandum of his investigation and placed it in Williams‘s personnel file. He testified he forgot to do so right after he finished his investigation.
In March 2010, Williams reported a supervisor in her department who was making phone calls about union matters to her work phone and to her parents’ home. The Office of the Inspector General investigated the report as a potential misuse of County resources to support union candidates. The supervisor was eventually disciplined with a short suspension.
C. Workers’ Compensation Dispute
In May 2010, Williams was injured at work by Anthony Jordan, a co-worker. Jordan yanked a door open while Williams was holding it, causing her to injure her shoulder. During the incident, he yelled, “Why don‘t you report this too, b**ch?” She took a medical leave for the injury, filed a workers’ compensation claim, and began receiving temporary total disability (TTD) benefits. At the start of her leave, Rose Golden, the director of Human Resources for the department, sent Williams a letter asking her to let Golden know when she was able to return.
In December 2010, Williams reсeived an independent medical evaluation (IME) from the Cook County Medical Office, which determined she was capable of returning to work. No one noticed the report until June 2011, when Jason Henschel, a claims adjuster for the risk management department, saw the report in Williams‘s workers’ compensation file. Henschel informed Golden about the IME, and Golden sent Williams a letter asking her to return to work on August 2. It also directed her to obtain a return to work certification from the Medical Office and a release to return tо work from her personal physician. The letter warned that if Williams failed to return to work, the Department would consider it an implied resignation, which was grounds for termination.
Williams went to the Medical Office for an evaluation on August 1. The county doctor approved Williams to return to work, but the form releasing her to return to work also noted
Meanwhile, Williams‘s attorney, Jason Marzal, was negotiating her TTD benefits with Andrew Schwartz, an attorney for the risk management office. Based on the IME, Schwartz informed Marzal that the County would only pay benefits through August 2. Marzal responded with a letter from Williams‘s personal physician stating she was unable to work until August 10. On August 16, Marzal sent Schwartz a new note from Williams‘s physician, stating she would be allowed to return to work on September 3. On approximately August 22, the attorneys discussed the case at the Illinois Workers’ Compensation Commission, and Marzal testified that the two orally agreed that Williams would return to work on September 6. Schwartz denies reaching this agreement, and says the conversatiоn was only about settling the benefits dispute. A couple of days later, Marzal sent Schwartz a fax informing him that Williams would return to work on September 6 and demanding reinstatement of her benefits.
During these negotiations, Williams did not inform Golden of her new return to work date. Golden testified that she did not know the negotiations were taking place at all. After consulting with Rohan, Golden sent Williams a termination letter on August 30, stating that based on Williams‘s failure to communicate any intent to return to work, and the apparent expiration of her workers’ compensation benefits, OCJ was terminating her for implied resignation.
On September 6, Williams went to Golden and told her she did not think she was supposed to return to work until that day. Surprised, Golden called Schwartz to ask if he had authorized a September 6 return to work date, and he denied doing so. Golden reaffirmed the termination decision. On September 22, Marzal and Schwartz finalized a settlement agreement which provided Williams a lump-sum award and 6 weeks of TTD benefits for her workers’ compensation claim.
D. Proceedings Below
Williams brought this suit alleging that OCJ and Rohan terminated her for a variety of unlawful reasons. She sued under the
II. ANALYSIS
On appeal, Williams argues that the district court erred in granting summary judgment to the defendants on each of hеr claims, and by denying her summary judgment on her workers’ compensation claim. We review a district court‘s grant of summary judgment de novo, and construe all facts and draw all reasonable inferences in favor of the non-moving party. Ellis v. DHL Express, Inc., 633 F.3d 522, 525 (7th Cir. 2011).
A. Williams Failed to Meet Causation Requirement of Workers’ Compensation Retaliation Claim
The Illinois Supreme Court has recognized a common-law cause of action for retaliatory discharge when an employee is terminated because of his actual or anticipated exercise of workers’ compensation rights. Kelsay v. Motorola, Inc., 384 N.E.2d 353, 357 (Ill. 1978). That cause of action is codified under the Illinois Workers’ Compensation Act,
Williams argues that her doctor‘s opinion about her return to work date caused her to believe she was permitted to stay off work until September 6. So, she argues, the conflict between her personal doctor‘s opinion and the IME caused her termination. In support of this argument, she relies heavily on Grabs v. Safeway, 917 N.E.2d 122 (Ill. App. Ct. 2009), an Illinois appellate case which held that an employer may not rely solely on an IME in terminating an employee for failing to call in his absences. There, the plaintiff was injured and filed a claim with his employer, which was initially approved. His
We see a critical difference between Grabs and this case. In Grabs, a decision-maker acted improperly on the knowledge of the disputed IME by recoding the plaintiff‘s work status in the attendance system. That improper act caused the plaintiff‘s termination. There is no evidence here that Golden acted with knowledge that Williams disputed her return to work date. In fact, Golden testified she had no idеa Williams believed her return to work date was September 6. From Golden‘s vantage point, Williams simply decided not to return to work.
The facts here are more akin to Beatty v. Olin, 693 F.3d 750 (7th Cir. 2012), where the decision-maker who fired the plaintiff had no knowledge of his return to work status. Id. at 751-52. We held there that firing someone based on incomplete or inaccurate information is legally insufficient to make out a retaliatory discharge claim—rather, a plaintiff must provide evidence that her employer was motivated to fire her for exercising her workers’ compensation rights. Id. at 754. We also required that a plаintiff who argues that a decision-maker is lying about his ignorance of an underlying workers’ compensation dispute provide evidence to support that position. Id. Similar to the plaintiff in Beatty, Williams failed to provide
To surmount this obstacle, Williams draws on Illinois case law that notice to an attorney constitutes notice to her client. Segal v. Ill. Dep‘t of Ins., 938 N.E.2d 192, 195 (Ill. App. Ct. 2010); Williams v. Dorsey, 652 N.E.2d 1286, 1290 (Ill. App. Ct. 1995); Eckel v. Bynum, 608 N.E.2d 167, 174 (Ill. App. Ct. 1992). But each of these cases deals with notice of judicial proceedings, not notice of the contents of every discussion between attorneys during a settlement negotiation. While we agree with the district court that the lаck of coordination between departments is unfortunate, “the retaliatory-discharge cause of action is narrow and requires evidence of retaliatory motive, not just sloppy personnel practices.” Beatty, 693 F.3d at 754 (emphasis in original). Employees can avert the danger of falling victim to disjointed intra-agency communications by keeping decision-makers informed of the status of their claims.
B. No Breach of Contract or Estoppel
Williams‘s second argument on appeal is that the district court erred in granting summary judgment to the defendants on her breach of contract and promissory estoppel claims. She argues that by firing her, OCJ breаched a verbal contract formed by Marzal and Schwartz regarding her return date.
Under Illinois contract law, which applies here, a plaintiff must show evidence of offer and acceptance to sustain a breach of contract claim. Ass‘n Benefit Servs., Inc. v. Caremark RX, Inc., 493 F.3d 841, 849 (7th Cir. 2007) (citing MC Baldwin Fin. Co. v. DiMaggio, Rosario & Veraja, LLC, 845 N.E.2d 22, 30 (Ill. App. Ct. 2006)). For an oral contract to exist, the parties must have a meeting of the minds with respect to the terms of the agreement and must intend to be bound by the agreement. Podolsky v. Alma Energy Corp., Inc., 143 F.3d 364, 369 (7th Cir. 1998).
Williams needed to put forth evidence to create a factual dispute about the following two issues: first, that Schwartz entered into an agreement with Marzal about Williams‘s return date, and second, that OCJ authorized him to do so. Danziger v. Pittsfield Shoe Co., 68 N.E. 534, 535-36 (Ill. 1903). To support Schwartz‘s authority to enter into the agreement, Williams provides Marzal‘s deposition testimony that he regularly negotiated return to work dates with attorneys in Schwartz‘s office, and argues that Golden would not have called Schwartz to inquire about whether he had altered her return to work date if he lacked the authority to do so. To support the fact that Schwartz actually bound OCJ to the September 6 return date, she points to Marzal‘s deposition testimony that on August 22, he had a conversation with Schwartz in which Schwartz agreed to let Williams return on September 6, and to the written settlement agreement, which listed her return to work date as September 6.
At his deposition, Marzal testified that his understanding from verbal conversations with Schwartz was that Williams was authorized to return to work on September 6. When asked why he believed this, he testified it was because “verbatim I can‘t tell you, but basically [Schwartz] was in concurrence with her returning back to work on the 6th, and he would communicate that to his client.” He also stated that “[Schwartz] represented that [Williams returning to work on September 6] is a problem and that we have to resolve it in Paula Williams‘s favor.” When pressed as to how OCJ would resolve it in Williams‘s favor, Marzal stated, “[Schwartz] said that Dr. Labanauskis is releasing her to go back to work and we will let her go back to work on the 6th. Basically that‘s what
The trickier question is whether Schwartz was actually authorized to bind OCJ to such a promise. Whether an agency relationship exists is generally a fact question, although a court may decide it as a question of law if only one conclusion may be drawn from the undisputed facts. Churkey v. Rustia, 768 N.E.2d 842, 845 (Ill. App. Ct. 2002). A party can establish an implied agency relationship through circumstantial evidence. C.A.M. Affiliates, Inc. v. First Am. Title Ins. Co., 715 N.E.2d 778, 783 (Ill. App. Ct. 1999). When settlements are made out of court, Illinois law does not presume that an attorney has authоrity to bind his client, and assigns the burden of proof to the party alleging authority. Brewer v. Nat‘l R.R. Passenger Corp., 649 N.E.2d 1331, 1334 (Ill. 1995) (citing Danziger, 68 N.E. at 535-36). In the absence of proof of express authority, an attorney‘s representations are not binding when they are later invoked against his client. Id.
The two pieces of evidence that Williams provides—Marzal‘s testimony that he regularly negotiated return dates with Cook County state‘s attorneys, and Golden‘s testimony that she checked with Schwartz about promising Williams a later return date—could not lead a reasonable fact-finder to conclude that OCJ expressly authorized Schwartz to determine Williams‘s return date. She also points to the settlement agreement the attorneys eventually entered with the Commission on November 26, which states that Williams was temporarily totally disabled through September 6. But the same document states that Williams was terminated on August 30 for alleged job abandonment. So the document cannot reasonably support an inference that OCJ authorized Schwartz to permit Williams to return to work on September 6.
Under Illinois law, to obtain equitable estoppel against a municipality, a plaintiff must demonstrate that (1) the municipality affirmatively acted, (2) the affirmative act induced substantial reliance, and (3) the aggrieved party substantially changed its position as a result of its justifiable reliance. Morgan Place of Chi. v. City of Chi., 975 N.E.2d 187, 195 (Ill. App. Ct. 2012) (holding that plaintiffs’ reliance on assertions by city officials about building permits did not warrant equitable estoppel against city). Justifiable reliance means that a plaintiff cannot “shut his eyes to obvious facts, or neglect to seek information that is easily accessible, and then charge his ignorance to others.” Village of Wadsworth v. Kerton, 726 N.E.2d 156, 164-65 (Ill. App. Ct. 2000).
Equitable estoppel is generally disfavored against municipal bodies, unless “it is necessary to prevent fraud and injustice.” Halleck v. Cnty. of Cook, 637 N.E.2d 1110, 1114 (Ill. App. Ct. 1994). The affirmative act must be made by the body itself, such as by a legislative enactment. See Schivarelli v. Chi. Transit Auth., 823 N.E.2d 158, 167-68 (Ill. App. Ct. 2005). Unauthorized acts of ministerial officers or misinterpretations generally do not meet the affirmative act requirement. Id. (finding no estoppel against transit authority board when it did not approve an agreement made between one of its employees and
However, occasionally, Illinois courts have found circumstances to be unjust enough to warrant estoppel. The general disfavoring of estoppel against a municipality is “qualified to enable a party to invoke [estoppel] where his action was induced by the conduct of a municipal official, and where, in the absence of such relief, he would suffer a substantial loss.” Chicago v. Miller, 188 N.E.2d 694, 696 (Ill. 1963). For example, erroneous conferral of public benefits is not normally a ground for estoppel, but at least one аppellate court has held that the Illinois Department of Public Aid can be estopped from recouping benefits from a plaintiff when one of its employees repeatedly miscalculated a claimant‘s benefits over the course of five years. Kruse v. Dep‘t of Pub. Aid, 596 N.E.2d 743, 745-46 (Ill. App. Ct. 1992). Similarly, while injury stemming from the issuance of an unauthorized permit does not typically warrant estoppel, where a municipal body “ratifies” the issuance by failing to revoke the permit for an extended period of time, estoppel has been found appropriate. Cities Service Oil Co. v. Des Plaines, 171 N.E.2d 605, 608 (Ill. 1961); Hagee v. Evanston, 414 N.E.2d 1184, 1187 (Ill. App. Ct. 1980).
It is hard to draw a clear line from this precedent to delineate where under Illinois law, an injustice is severe enough, and unfair enough, to warrant estoppel. But we find even taking all of Williams‘s factual allegations as true, they are insufficient to justify estoppel. Here, Marzal testified that Schwartz agreed to the September 6 return date and that he explicitly
C. Williams Has Failed to Produce a Material Factual Dispute About Race Discrimination or Retaliation
Williams next argues that she provided enough evidence to create a material factual dispute about whether she was fired because of her race, in violation of Title VII. We recently discarded the direct and indirect methods of proof for retaliation claims, and held that a plaintiff can surmount summary judgment if a reasonable factfinder could conclude that the plaintiff‘s race caused the discharge. Ortiz v. Werner Enters., No. 15-2574, 2016 WL 4411434, at *4 (7th Cir. Aug. 9, 2016), slip op. 10. We must consider evidence as a whole, rather than by asking whether any particular piece of evidence proves the case by itself. Id.
There is simply not enough evidence for a reasonable fact-finder to rule in favor of Williams. Her only evidence is that a white employee was given several chances to return to work after taking a similar leave. But to prevail by showing differential treatment of a similarly situated employee, a plaintiff must identify a comparator who is “directly comparable to her in all material respects ... to eliminate other possible explanatory variables.” Perez v. Thorntons, Inc., 731 F.3d 699, 704 (7th Cir. 2013). Here, the record evidence shows that the white employee repeatedly contacted Golden to keep her abreast of her extension requests. Golden testified that Williams was not fired for asking for extensions of leave, but for failing to get in touch at all. This was a material difference between the two employees, which prеvents Williams from arguing she was treated differently when all things were “in fact equal.” Filar v. Bd. of Educ. of City of Chi., 526 F.3d 1054, 1061 (7th Cir. 2008). Williams has not identified a similarly situated employee, which is fatal to her discrimination theory.
Williams also argues that she was fired for reporting racial discrimination by her white co-workers, in violation of
Williams also asks us to overrule our own precedent and find that Rohan can be held liable for race discrimination and retaliation under
D. No Illinois Whistleblower Act Violation
Williams‘s final theory of liability against the defendants is that they violated the Illinois Whistleblower Act by terminating her for reporting unlawful misconduct against her co-workers and for reporting misconduct by a supervisor to the OIG. The parties dispute whether Williams brought this claim in time to avoid the one year statute of limitations for tort actions against governmental entities.
Finally, Williams argues that the district court abused its discretion by awarding the defendants costs. A district court should provide an explanation for its decision to award or deny costs. Rivera v. City of Chicago, 469 F.3d 631, 636 (7th Cir. 2006). It only abuses its discretion in reviewing a bill of costs if “no reasonable person could take the view adopted by the trial court.” Id. The district court evaluated the documentation that Williams provided and found that she had more than sufficient income to pay the bill of costs. While Williams referenced an outstanding medical bill, she did not provide any documentation or explanation for the bill and its impact on her ability to pay the bill of costs. Under an abuse-of-discretion standard, there is no basis for vacating the award.
III. CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM the district court‘s grant of summary judgment.