NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FILED
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
JUL 29 2016
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
NORMAN DILLARD, an individual, No. 14-56380
Petitioner - Appellant, D.C. No. 8:13-cv-01655-JLS-JPR
v.
MEMORANDUM*
HYATT CORPORATION, a Delaware
corporation,
Respondent - Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Central District of California
Josephine L. Staton, District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted July 8, 2016
Pasadena, California
Before: VANASKIE,** MURGUIA, and WATFORD, Circuit Judges.
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.
**
The Honorable Thomas I. Vanaskie, United States Circuit Judge for
the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, sitting by designation.
Norman Dillard appeals from the district court’s order granting summary
judgment to Hyatt Corporation on his claims of employment discrimination on
account of race, age and disability. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291,
and we affirm the district court’s judgment.
1. With respect to his race discrimination claim, Dillard has not met his
burden of producing specific and substantial evidence that Hyatt’s stated reason for
terminating him—his failure to adequately supervise his subordinate’s company
credit card purchases—was “untrue or pretextual.” Dep’t of Fair Emp’t & Hous. v.
Lucent Techs., Inc., 642 F.3d 728, 746 (9th Cir. 2011) (quoting Hanson v. Lucky
Stores, Inc., 87 Cal. Rptr. 2d 487, 493 (Cal. Ct. App. 1999)). The statistical
evidence he produced is not sufficient to defeat summary judgment, whether
considered alone or in the context of his other evidence. See Aragon v. Republic
Silver State Disposal, Inc., 292 F.3d 654, 663–64 (9th Cir. 2002). Quite simply,
Dillard did not produce evidence that demonstrates “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.” Lucent Techs., 642 F.3d at 746
(citation omitted). Moreover, Dillard has not produced any evidence of racial
animus on the part of the decisionmaker, Kevin Kennedy, or proffered any
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evidence that Kennedy was influenced by the racial animus of another. In fact,
Kennedy had hired Dillard and, just months before terminating him, had given
Dillard the highest annual salary increase of the eight directors that worked
underneath Kennedy. This gives rise to “a strong inference . . . that there was no
discriminatory motive.” Bradley v. Harcourt, Brace & Co., 104 F.3d 267, 271 (9th
Cir. 1996); see also Schechner v. KPIX-TV, 686 F.3d 1018, 1026 (9th Cir. 2012);
Coghlan v. Am. Seafoods Co., 413 F.3d 1090, 1098 (9th Cir. 2005). Accordingly,
Dillard has failed to raise a triable issue as to whether Hyatt’s stated reason for
termination was untrue or pretextual. See Lucent Techs., 642 F.3d at 746.
2. For similar reasons, we affirm the district court’s grant of summary
judgment in favor of Hyatt on Dillard’s age discrimination claim. The only
evidence Dillard presented to show that Hyatt’s stated reason for termination was
pretext for age discrimination is two remarks made by Kennedy. Dillard, however,
concedes that the two remarks do not “in of themselves raise a triable issue of fact
as to pretext.” (Appellant Br. at 58–59.) Kennedy’s comments are classic “stray
remark[s]” that do not support an inference of age discrimination. See Nesbit v.
Pepsico, Inc., 994 F.2d 703, 705 (9th Cir. 1993).
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3. We likewise affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment in
favor of Hyatt on Dillard’s disability discrimination claim. The declaration of Jane
Guest is insufficient to infer a pattern and practice of disability discrimination
because it provides only one subjective, anecdotal example of alleged disability
discrimination. Compare Coghlan, 413 F.3d at 1099–1100 (“[E]ven a pattern of
three replacements is, under our precedent, too small a sample . . . .”), with
Johnson v. United Cerebral Palsy/Spastic Children’s Found. of L.A. & Ventura
Ctys., 93 Cal. Rptr. 3d 198, 212–15 (Cal. Ct. App. 2009).
AFFIRMED.
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