UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIRST CIRCUIT
No. 93-1150
ANGEL L. ALVAREZ-SANCHEZ, ET AL.,
Plaintiffs, Appellants,
v.
JOSE E. APONTE DE LA TORRE, ETC., ET AL.,
Defendants, Appellees.
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF PUERTO RICO
[Hon. Jose Antonio Fuste, U.S. District Judge]
Before
Selya, Circuit Judge,
Aldrich and Coffin, Senior Circuit Judges.
Armando Cardona-Estelritz with whom Isidro Garcia Pesquera Law
Offices was on brief for appellants.
Jacqueline D. Novas-Debien with whom Carlos Lugo Fiol, Acting
Solicitor General, Reina Colon De Rodriguez, Acting Deputy Solicitor
General, Pedro Juan Perez Nieves and Saldana, Rey & Alvarado were on
brief for appellees.
September 29, 1993
ALDRICH, Senior Circuit Judge. This 42 U.S.C.
1983 action was commenced on June 27, 1991, and was
dismissed as out of time. We affirm.
Defendant, mayor of Carolina, Puerto Rico,
determined that a large number of municipal employees had
been hired as career employees by procedures that did not
comply with the Puerto Rico Personnel statute. On May 23,
1989 he wrote each one a basically form letter to that
effect, but stating that recipient employee could request a
hearing in 15 days to seek to show error in the records. If
a hearing was not requested, or if the hearing was
unsuccessful, the employee would be discharged, but would be
given provisional employment during which he or she could
appeal, or apply for new employment. The present twelve
plaintiffs obtained hearings, but were unsuccessful.
Thereafter, during the summer of 1989, each received a letter
from defendant mayor notifying him or her of that fact and
stating that severance "shall be effective" one week from the
date of the letter. They were told they could apply for new
employment, but none did. Plaintiffs were continued as
provisionals until July 23, 1990, at which time all were
totally terminated. They sue for their loss of career
employment.
On defendants' motion for summary judgment the
court held that the May 23, 1989 letters were sufficient
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notification of discharge to start the one year statute of
limitations, rejecting plaintiffs' claim of July, 1990. We
concur in the judgment, but do so without reaching
plaintiffs' contention that the May letters were ambiguous
and not to be read as definite. Even were that so, the
letters sent in the summer of 1989 were unmistakably clear,
and were nearly two years before suit.
Plaintiffs' sole answer is that the court did not
rely on the 1989 summer letters. This neglects the
elementary principle that if a court's result is correct it
must be affirmed even though the court gave a wrong reason.1
Brown v. Allen, 344 U.S. 443, 459 (1953). Persisting in this
error, plaintiffs refused to include the summer letters, and
the pretrial order that admitted their receipt, in their
appendix, even though the court ordered them to do so.2
Instead, in their brief, plaintiffs brazenly refer to the
July 23, 1990 letters as "a second series of letters" rather
than as the third.
1. We doubt that the court erred as to the very lengthy May
letters, but need not pursue analysis.
2. Defendants, as well as having to supplement the appendix,
have had to bring four motions. Plaintiffs continually
failed to file their brief, and failed to make proper
service, or to comply with an order to explain their
insufficient appendix. The court referred defendants'
request for sanctions to the sitting panel, and so advised
plaintiffs.
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This appeal is worse than frivolous, and counsel's
conduct calls for sanctions against him personally, pursuant
to Fed. R. App. P. 38, as damages and for vexatious conduct,
in the amount of $2,500, payable to defendants, and not to be
waived.
Affirmed, with double costs.
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