Terry Doubt v. Ncr Corp. , 668 F. App'x 238 ( 2016 )

FILED
AUG 10 2016
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
TERRY DOUBT, No. 14-16530
Plaintiff - Appellant, D.C. No. 4:09-cv-05917-SBA
v.
MEMORANDUM*
NCR CORPORATION,
Defendant - Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of California
Saundra Brown Armstrong, District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted July 8, 2016
San Francisco, California
Before: BERZON and N.R. SMITH, Circuit Judges and CHRISTENSEN,** Chief
District Judge.
Plaintiff Terry Doubt appeals from the district court’s grant of summary
judgment to Defendant NCR Corporation. We have jurisdiction pursuant to 28
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.
**
The Honorable Dana L. Christensen, Chief District Judge for the U.S.
District Court for the District of Montana, sitting by designation.
U.S.C. § 1291, and we affirm. As the parties are familiar with the facts, we do not
recount them here.
1. The district court did not err in granting summary judgment to NCR on
Doubt’s claim for age discrimination on the basis of disparate treatment. Doubt’s
disparate treatment claim fails because he failed to produce any evidence of
intentional discrimination on the basis of age. Guz v. Bechtel Nat’l Inc., 8 P.3d
1089, 1113 n.20 (Cal. 2000).
2. Doubt failed to meet his burden to defeat summary judgment for NCR on his
claim for age discrimination on the basis of disparate impact. Pursuant to the
California Fair Employment and Housing Act (“FEHA”), courts are instructed to
“interpret the state’s statutes prohibiting age discrimination in employment broadly
and vigorously . . . , and with the goal of . . . protecting older workers as a group . .
. .” Cal. Gov’t Code § 12941. Notably, California makes clear that “the use of
salary as the basis for differentiating between employees when terminating
employment may be found to constitute age discrimination if use of that criterion
adversely impacts older workers as a group[.]” Id.
Doubt argues that he was terminated because NCR no longer wanted to pay
his salary. However, he did not offer any statistical evidence raising an inference
that NCR’s cost-cutting employment practices caused adverse employment
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outcomes for workers over forty. See Life Techs. Corp. v. Super. Ct., 130 Cal.
Rptr. 3d 80, 87–88 (Cal. Ct. App. 2011) (citations omitted). To support his claim,
Doubt states that he was terminated but that four younger workers who performed
similarly were not. These four younger workers were not similarly situated to
Doubt, and they seem to have been hand-selected from a much larger pool of
workers for no reason except to support Doubt’s argument. Doubt also asserts that
all of the employees in his position who were terminated during a ten-month period
were over the age of forty, but he offers no explanation for analyzing only that
particular ten-month time period. Additionally, his analysis does not consider the
workers over the age of forty subsequently hired by NCR. Doubt’s gerrymandered
data sets do not adequately support his disparate impact claim.
3. The district court appropriately granted summary judgment to NCR on
Doubt’s claim for retaliatory discharge. Doubt argues that “he engaged in a
protected activity” either by working overtime or by complaining about his
working conditions. Flait v. N. Am. Watch Corp., 4 Cal. Rptr. 2d 522, 528 (Cal.
Ct. App. 1992). However, he produced no evidence of the necessary “causal link”
between either activity and his termination, and his claim fails. Id.
4. Nor did the district court err in granting summary judgment to NCR on
Doubt’s claim for breach of implied contract. Doubt claims that NCR could
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terminate him only for good cause. Under California law, in the absence of an
express agreement, employment is presumed to be at-will. Guz, 8 P.3d at 1100;
Cal. Lab. Code § 2922. Doubt offered no evidence that NCR terminated
employees exclusively for cause, and he failed to rebut the presumption of at-will
employment.
5. Finally, Doubt failed to meet his burden to defeat summary judgment on his
claim for breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing. Because
Doubt has no claim for breach of contract, his claim necessarily fails. See Foley v.
Interactive Data Corp., 765 P.2d 373, 400 n.39 (Cal. 1988). The district court did
not err in finding that NCR was entitled to summary judgment on all claims.
6. Doubt’s appeal from the district court’s denial of discovery sanctions is
without merit. The district court did not abuse its discretion in denying both entry
of judgment (which is extreme) and remand to the state court (which is legally
unsupportable) when NCR’s failure to comply with the requirements of discovery
was at least partially attributable to Doubt’s overreaching.
7. Because we affirm the grant of summary judgment, we do not consider
Doubt’s argument for reassignment on remand.
8. As a final matter, we note that waiver would also have been an appropriate
ground for granting summary judgment to NCR. Doubt’s brief in opposition to
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summary judgment was woefully inadequate, containing only two pages of cursory
legal argument on eight causes of action. Given the extreme deficiencies of
Doubt’s brief, the district court’s ability and willingness to address the merits of
the case is commendable.
AFFIRMED.
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