Plaintiff employee appealed a summary judgment from the Superior Court of San Mateo County (California), which ruled in favor of defendants, his former employer and a supervisor, on claims of employment discrimination and related causes of action, including harassment under Gov. Code, § 12940, subd. (j)(1), and retaliation under § 12940, subd. (h). Expert witness designation included employment lawyer for all parties during pretrial discovery.
Table of Contents
Overview
The employee repeatedly complained to his supervisor and to the human resources department about harassment from coworkers based on his color, religion, and national origin. The supervisor promoted the employee but later terminated him after he was accused of assaulting a coworker. The court held that a blanket ruling sustaining all but one of a voluminous number of defense objections was error. The court concluded that there was a triable issue of fact as to harassment because the employee exhausted his administrative remedies by submitting materials that adequately identified the harassment claim and because the continuing violation doctrine could make the claim timely. As to discrimination, there was a triable issue of fact as to pretext because the purported assault was inadequately investigated and because the same supervisor’s involvement in both the promotion and the termination created only an inference of nondiscriminatory intent under Evid. Code, § 600, subd. (b), not a presumption under § 600, subd. (a). In light of the evidence of pretext, the employer was not entitled to summary judgment as to retaliation, although the supervisor could have no individual liability.
Outcome
The court reversed the summary judgment, affirmed summary adjudications as to three causes of action against the supervisor, affirmed summary adjudications as to a waived claim of disability discrimination and claims of fraud and battery, and otherwise reversed the summary adjudications.
Procedural Posture
In a dispute involving the arbitration clause of an employment agreement, defendant nonsignatory appealed from an order of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County (California), which denied the nonsignatory’s petition to compel arbitration of plaintiff signatory’s claims.
Overview
According to the employment agreement, the signatory was to be employed as senior vice president and division president for a three year-term. Within the first year, the employer’s president informed the signatory that all of the employer’s Southern California operations or assets were being transferred to the nonsignatory. The president added that the signatory would no longer be working for the employer but would be working for the nonsignatory, who refused to honor the employment agreement. The signatory was terminated after he refused to enter into a new agreement with the nonsignatory. The court held that the signatory was equitably estopped from avoiding arbitration of his causes of action against the nonsignatory because his claims were intimately founded in and intertwined with the employment agreement. The claims all made reference to and presumed the validity of the employment agreement. That some of the claims were cast in tort rather than contract did not avoid the arbitration clause. Moreover, the employer and the nonsignatory were both owned, at least in majority part, by the same entity.
Outcome
The court reversed the order denying defendant’s petition to compel arbitration and directed the trial court to enter a new order granting the nonsignatory’s petition to compel arbitration.