Opinions of the United
2008 Decisions States Court of Appeals
for the Third Circuit
6-11-2008
Lloyd v. Washington
Precedential or Non-Precedential: Non-Precedential
Docket No. 07-2907
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NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
____________
No. 07-2907
____________
KARL BRETT LLOYD,
Appellant
v.
WASHINGTON & JEFFERSON COLLEGE
.
____________
On Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Western District of Pennsylvania
(D.C. No. 05-cv-00802)
District Judge: Honorable Terrence F. McVerry
____________
Submitted Under Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a)
May 22, 2008
Before: SMITH, HARDIMAN and NYGAARD, Circuit Judges.
(Filed: June 11, 2008)
____________
OPINION OF THE COURT
____________
HARDIMAN, Circuit Judge.
Karl Brett Lloyd appeals an order of the District Court adopting the Magistrate
Judge’s Report and Recommendation (R&R) that summary judgment be granted in favor
of Washington & Jefferson College (College). We will affirm.
I.
As we write for the parties, we will recount only those facts essential to our
decision.
Lloyd was an Associate Professor in the College’s Information Technology
Leadership (ITL) Department from July 1, 2002 until April 5, 2004. In April 2003, a
policy was instituted for all full-time ITL faculty requiring that “they be on campus a
minimum of four days per week, for at least four hours per day . . . .” Nevertheless,
Lloyd spent only three days per week on campus and worked from home the rest of the
week. In January 2004, Lloyd took leave under the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA)
for certain medical problems caused by stress, such as leg pain. During that time, Lloyd
advised the College that Dr. Charles Hannon, Chair of the ITL Department, was “the
source of his physical problems.”
Following Lloyd’s return to the College in February and his requests for additional
FMLA leave and certain accommodations under the Americans with Disabilities Act
(ADA), the College agreed to transfer Lloyd to a non-teaching position in the Information
Technology Services (ITS) Department where he could work three days per week under
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the ITS Director, Daniel Faulk. The College communicated this offer to Lloyd in a letter
which explicitly requested that Lloyd report to Faulk on April 5, 2004, at 9:00 a.m. if he
accepted the offer. After Lloyd failed to report to work in the ITS Department that day,
the College considered him to have resigned.
II.
Lloyd first argues that his “record of impairment,” as evidenced by his history of
treatment for agoraphobia and panic attacks and receipt of Social Security Disability
payments, precludes summary judgment on his ADA claims. This assertion is an
inaccurate statement of law to the extent it suggests that a record of impairment1 suffices
absent substantial limitation on a major life activity. See Kelly v. Drexel Univ., 94 F.3d
102, 108 (3d Cir. 1996) (observing that this Court cannot regard a medical impairment as
a “disability” under the ADA if it does not “substantially limit [a] relevant major life
activity”); see also Gordon v. E.L. Hamm & Assocs., Inc., 100 F.3d 907, 911 (11th Cir.
1996) (stating that a physical impairment is not enough for purposes of the ADA);
1
We reject Lloyd’s contention that his receipt of SSA benefits qualifies as a
“record of impairment” under the circumstances of this case. The definition of disability
under the Social Security program differs from the definition of disability under the ADA,
such that receipt of Social Security benefits does not necessarily establish that a person is
“a qualified individual with a disability” within the meaning of the ADA. Cleveland v.
Policy Management Systems Corp., 526 U.S. 795, 802-805 (1999); see also 42 U.S.C.
§ 12112(a). Accordingly, we require “[a] plaintiff attempting to prove the existence of a
‘record’ of disability [to] demonstrate that the recorded impairment is a ‘disability’ within
the meaning of the ADA.” Tice v. Centre Area Transp. Auth., 247 F.3d 506, 513 (3d Cir.
2001). Here, Lloyd has not attempted to show how his receipt of disability benefits from
the SSA is equivalent to a “record of impairment” within the ADA framework.
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Dutcher v. Ingalls Shipbuilding, 53 F.3d 723, 726 (5th Cir. 1995) (explaining that “[a]
physical impairment, standing alone, is not necessarily a disability as contemplated by the
ADA”).
Perhaps anticipating this flaw in his first argument, Lloyd claims that he is
substantially limited in his ability to think and interact with others. A substantial
limitation occurs under the ADA only if the person is “[s]ignificantly restricted as to the
condition, manner, and duration under which an individual can perform a major life
activity as compared to the condition, manner, or duration under which an average person
in the general population can perform the same major life activity.” 29 C.F.R.
§ 1630.2(j)(1).
The record demonstrates that Lloyd is not substantially limited in that he was able
to work and/or teach on campus three days per week, as well as serve as a councilman for
Trafford Borough, engage in family and social outings, and spend hours on weekends
working on ITS projects and course development. See Andreoli v. Gates, 482 F.3d 641,
651-52 (3d Cir. 2007) (finding that the plaintiff was not limited in the major life activities
of “thinking” and “interacting with others,” where all of the plaintiff’s activities required
“thinking, concentrating, and interacting with others.”). In sum, the only limitation — if
it can properly be classified as such — that Lloyd professed, was his inability to be on
campus more than three days per week. In her thorough and lucid R&R, the Magistrate
Judge properly concluded that, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to Lloyd,
4
no reasonable juror could find that he was substantially limited in a major life activity.
Furthermore, we agree with the R&R’s finding that if Lloyd were, in fact, substantially
limited in his ability to think and interact with others, he would not be a qualified person
with a disability. See 42 U.S.C. § 12112(a); see also Cleveland, 526 U.S. at 806. The
fact that the ability to think and interact with others are prerequisites for a college
professor should be self-evident.2
Lloyd next argues that the College interfered with his exercise of FMLA rights by
terminating him instead of granting his request to take a medical leave of absence for the
Spring term, and genuine issues of material fact preclude summary judgment on the
question of whether he exhausted his FMLA leave. The R&R concluded that Lloyd did
not have a serious health condition that precluded him from working as an Associate
Professor. We agree with this conclusion and find that Lloyd was not eligible for FMLA
leave.3 Even so, the record is clear that Lloyd exhausted any leave to which he might
2
In light of this holding, we need not discuss Lloyd’s claim that the College failed
to engage in the interactive process. See Gaul v. Lucent Technologies, Inc., 134 F.3d 576,
581 (3d Cir. 1998) (because plaintiff was not a qualified individual with a disability,
defendant’s “alleged failure to investigate into reasonable accommodation is
unimportant.”).
3
We also conclude that Lloyd cannot show that he was prejudiced in the sense
that he lost the chance to be reinstated following an FMLA leave of absence. The
purpose of the FMLA is to assist employees “who have serious health conditions that
prevent them from working for temporary periods.” 29 U.S.C. § 2601(a)(4) (emphasis
added). An FMLA plaintiff must show that, by the time he returned from his allotted 12
weeks of FMLA leave, he would have been “able to perform the essential functions of
that position.” See Rinehimer v. Cemcolift, Inc., 292 F.3d 375, 384 (3d Cir. 2002) (citing
29 C.F.R. § 825.214(b)). Lloyd admits that he requested FMLA “leave to be followed by
5
have been entitled. See 29 U.S.C. § 2612(a)(1)(D) (stating that the FMLA grants eligible
employees the right to take up to twelve work weeks of leave in any twelve-month period
if a “serious health condition . . . makes the employee unable to perform the functions of
the position of such employee.”). As noted in its brief, the College was not required to
designate Lloyd’s leave under the FMLA for it to count toward the 12 weeks allowed by
statute. Ragsdale v. Wolverine World Wide, Inc., 535 U.S. 81, 88-89 (2002). The
College’s Director of Human Resources stated that Lloyd took 14.2 weeks of paid leave
between December 1, 2003 and April 4, 2004, which was 2.2 weeks more than he was
entitled to under law.
Finally, Lloyd contends that he presented enough evidence to defeat summary
judgment on his discrimination and retaliation claims under the ADA, FMLA, and
Pennsylvania Human Relations Act (PHRA). To make a prima facie showing of
discrimination, Lloyd must show that, inter alia, he suffered an adverse employment
action. See Jones v. School District of Philadelphia, 198 F.3d 403 (3d Cir. 1999). Lloyd
complains that the College improperly discharged him instead of granting his request for
leave for the Spring 2004 term, to be followed by permission to return to campus only
three days per week. The record is clear, however, that the College made numerous
the implementation of the accommodation” upon his return and that he made no effort to
show that he would have been capable of returning to a full-time teaching schedule under
Hannon — both of which would have been essential conditions of the job he held in the
College’s ITL department.
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reasonable accommodations — including a temporary transfer away from Hannon in
January 2004, a schedule under Faulk which would permit him to attend his Tuesday and
Thursday doctor’s appointments in February 2004, and finally, a three-day workweek
under Faulk beginning in March 2004 — which were undertaken in good-faith to
ameliorate the stress that Lloyd experienced when he was on campus. Instead of
accepting this reasonable accommodation, Lloyd insisted upon being on campus only
three days per which, which would have been a waiver of an essential job function that
the College was not required to accept. See Donahue v. Consolidated Rail Corp., 224
F.3d 226, 232 (3d Cir. 2000). Accordingly, we find no error in the court’s dismissal of
Lloyd’s ADA, FMLA, and PHRA discrimination claims.
We also find no error in the District Court’s rejection of Lloyd’s retaliation claims
on the ground that, assuming he had made out a prima facie case of retaliation, he could
not show that the College’s articulated non-retaliatory reasons for its actions were
pretextual. Specifically, Lloyd failed to submit specific evidence which would cause a
factfinder to either “(1) disbelieve the employer’s articulated legitimate reasons; or (2)
believe that an invidious retaliatory reason was more likely than not a motivating or
determinative cause of the employer’s action.” Keller v. Orix Credit Alliance, Inc., 130
F.3d 1101, 1108 (3d Cir. 1997) (en banc) (internal quotation marks omitted). The
evidence shows that on the eve of Lloyd’s discharge, the College offered Lloyd an
administrative position in the ITS Department three days per week. Lloyd failed to report
7
to work and the College determined that he resigned. In claiming that retaliation can be
inferred from his “involuntary transfer[]” to the ITS administrative position, Lloyd
overlooks the fact that he asked to be removed from Hannon’s supervision. This transfer
accommodated that request, and also gave Lloyd a sufficiently flexible schedule to enable
him to attend his doctors’ appointments on Tuesdays and Thursdays: all without reducing
Lloyd’s salary. Thus, no rational trier of fact could find that Lloyd’s transfer was
retaliatory. See Fuentes v. Perskie, 32 F.3d 759, 765 (3d. Cir. 1994) (explaining that “the
non-moving plaintiff must demonstrate such weaknesses, implausibilities,
inconsistencies, incoherencies, or contradictions in the employer’s proffered legitimate
reasons for its action that a reasonable factfinder could rationally find them unworthy of
credence . . . .”) (citations and internal quotations omitted).
For all of the foregoing reasons, we will affirm the judgment of the District Court.
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