NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
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No. 18-2850
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ZIBA MONFARED,
Appellant
v.
ST. LUKE’S UNIVERSITY HEALTH NETWORK; ST. LUKE’S PHYSICIAN GROUP
INC. FKA St. Luke’s Health Services Inc.; NAZARETH FAMILY PRACTICE
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Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
(D.C. Civil Action No. 5-15-cv-04017)
District Judge: Honorable Joseph F. Leeson, Jr.
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Submitted Under Third Circuit L.A.R. 34.1(a)
April 15, 2019
Before: AMBRO, GREENAWAY, JR., and SCIRICA, Circuit Judges
(Opinion filed: May 10, 2019)
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OPINION *
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AMBRO, Circuit Judge
*
This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7 does not
constitute binding precedent.
Dr. Ziba Monfared worked as a physician in Nazareth, Pennsylvania, for St.
Luke’s University Health Network, St. Luke’s Physician Group, Inc., and Nazareth
Family Practice (collectively “St. Luke’s”) from May 2010 until her termination in
December 2014. Dr. Monfared brought retaliation claims against St. Luke’s under Title
VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000e et seq., 42 U.S.C. § 1981, and
the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act, 43 PS. §§ 951 et seq. She alleged that it
terminated her after she complained about racially discriminatory and harassing remarks
by management. St. Luke’s filed a Motion to Compel Arbitration arguing that the
dispute was covered by her employment agreement. 1 The District Court granted the
1
The applicable provision of the employment agreement reads in full:
Governing Law; Dispute Resolution
This letter agreement shall be deemed to have been made and shall be construed and
interpreted in accordance with the laws of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. In
any equitable action for specific performance or injunctive relief, the parties hereby
submit to the jurisdiction of the Court of Lehigh County, Commonwealth of
Pennsylvania. Except for actions for specific performance or injunctive relief, if a
dispute or claim should arise that does not get resolved through negotiation of the
parties, the parties will attempt in good faith to resolve the dispute or claim by
mediation administered by the American Arbitration Association (AAA) under its
Employment Mediation Rules, before resorting to arbitration. . . . If the matter has
not been resolved within sixty (60) days of the initiation of such procedure, or if
either party refuses to participate in the mediation, the controversy shall be resolved
by binding arbitration under the Employment Arbitration Rules of the AAA, by one
neutral arbitrator. . . . THE ARBITRATOR SHALL NOT AWARD ANY PARTY
PUNITIVE OR EXEMPLARY DAMAGES, AND EACH PARTY HEREBY
IRREVICABLY WAIVES ANY RIGHT TO SEEK SUCH DAMAGES. All costs
of mediation or arbitration shall evenly be divided between the parties, exclusive of
each party’s legal fees, each of which shall be borne by the party that incurs them.
J.A. at 4 (emphasis added; bold in text).
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motion, after which the matter proceeded to arbitration. 2 The arbitrator ultimately ruled
in favor of St. Luke’s, and the District Court confirmed this award and dismissed Dr.
Monfared’s claims. She now appeals, arguing that her claims were not subject to
arbitration under the contract.
We apply plenary review over the District Court’s ruling on the motion to compel
arbitration, and we assess the motion to compel itself under the standard for summary
judgment in Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56(a). Flintkote Co. v. Aviva PLC, 769 F.3d
215, 219 (3d Cir. 2014). Thus we view the facts in the light most favorable to the non-
moving party, and grant the motion only if there is no genuine dispute as to any material
fact and the movant—here St. Luke’s—is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Id.
The Federal Arbitration Act (“FAA”), 9 U.S.C. §§ 1 et seq., “creates a body of
federal substantive law establishing and governing the duty to honor agreements to
arbitrate disputes.” Century Indem. Co. v. Certain Underwriters at Lloyd’s, London, 584
F.3d 513, 522 (3d Cir. 2009); see also Moses H. Cone Mem’l Hosp. v. Mercury Constr.
Corp., 460 U.S. 1, 24 (1983). To decide whether to compel arbitration under the FAA,
we first consider “whether there is a valid agreement to arbitrate between the parties.”
Flintkote Co., 769 F.3d at 220. If so, we then consider “whether the merits-based dispute
in question falls within the scope of that valid agreement.” Id. Here, the parties agree
that Dr. Monfared’s employment contract contained a valid arbitration agreement. See
2
The record does not reflect whether, in accord with the terms of the employment
contract, the parties engaged in mediation before proceeding to arbitration. As the parties
have not discussed the question of mediation, we presume it does not affect our analysis.
3
Appellant’s Br. at 15–16. The only question, therefore, is whether her claims are within
the scope of that agreement.
“In determining whether the particular dispute falls within a valid arbitration
agreement’s scope, ‘there is a presumption of arbitrability[.]’” Century Indem. Co., 584
F.3d at 524 (quoting AT & T Techs., Inc. v. Comm. Workers of Am., 475 U.S. 643, 650
(1986)). This presumption applies whenever a contract has an arbitration clause and is
“particularly applicable where the clause is [] broad.” AT & T Techs., Inc., 475 U.S. at
650. When the presumption applies, “a court may not deny a motion to compel
arbitration ‘unless it may be said with positive assurance that the . . . arbitration clause is
not susceptible of an interpretation that covers the dispute.’” Cup v. Ampco Pittsburgh
Corp., 903 F.3d 58, 64–65 (3d Cir. 2018) (quoting AT & T Techs., Inc., 475 U.S. at 650).
In relevant part, the contract here reads:
Except for actions for specific performance or injunctive relief, if a dispute
or claim should arise that does not get resolved through negotiation of the
parties, the parties will attempt in good faith to resolve the dispute or claim
by mediation administered by the American Arbitration Association (AAA)
under its Employment Mediation Rules, before resorting to arbitration.
J.A. at 4. Dr. Monfared argues that this language is limited to disputes over the
interpretation of the letter agreement itself, because an earlier sentence in the same
section of the contract states that “[t]his letter agreement shall be deemed to have been
made and shall be construed and interpreted in accordance with the laws of the
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.” She notes that, unlike many arbitration agreements,
hers does not include language referring to “any claim arising from” her employment, or
the like.
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We do not agree. It does not appear that any federal court has addressed an
arbitration agreement with language similar to this one. But in light of the presumption
in favor of arbitrability, we think the phrase “if a dispute or claim should arise” is best
understood as functionally equivalent to more standard language that would expressly
sweep in any claim relating to Dr. Monfared’s employment. The only textual exclusion
applies only to actions for specific performance or injunctive relief. And it does not
make sense to view the entire section at issue as limited to the interpretation of the
contract itself. The section includes effectively three provisions: a choice-of-law
provision stating that Pennsylvania law shall apply to the construction of the contract; a
forum selection clause providing for jurisdiction in the Lehigh County court; and the
arbitration provision. The choice-of-law provision is naturally limited to interpretation of
the contract, and this does not reflect on the neighboring provisions, which address
separate concerns.
Thus we affirm.
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