Marc Flagg vs. AliMed, Inc.
Case Details
- Citation
- 466 Mass. 23
- Procedural Posture — the stage the case had reached
- motion to dismiss
- State
- Massachusetts
- Circuit
- 1st Circuit
Related Laws
No specific laws identified for this ruling.
Claim Types
Outcome
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court reversed the Superior Court's dismissal of the plaintiff's employment discrimination claim, holding that associational discrimination based on a spouse's disability violates Massachusetts employment law. The court ruled that an employer cannot terminate an employee because of the employee's family member's disabling medical condition.
Excerpt
Marc Flagg vs. AliMed, Inc. Norfolk. January 8, 2013. July 19, 2013. Present: Ireland, C.J., Spina, Cordy, Botsford, Gants, Duffly, & Lenk, JJ. Anti-Discrimination Law, Employee, Employment, Handicap, Association, Termination of employment. Employment, Discrimination, Termination. Practice, Civil, Motion to dismiss. Statute, Construction. Libel and Slander. Actionable Tort. This court concluded that, in the circumstances of a civil action alleging employment discrimination on the basis of handicap, the Superior Court judge erred in dismissing, for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted, the plaintiff’s claim of associational discrimination, i.e., that the plaintiff’s employment had been terminated, despite the plaintiff being an otherwise qualified, adequately performing employee, because the defendant employer did not want to bear the burden of increased health care costs (under a family medical insurance benefit that the employer provided to the plaintiff) when the plaintiff’s wife developed a disabling medical condition, where the language and purpose of G. L. c. 151B, § 4 (16), as well as decisions of the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination, favored an interpretation of the statute prohibiting employment discrimination based on the disability of a family member, and where Federal antidiscrimination statutes have been interpreted to allow claims of associational discrimination. [27-37] Gants, J., concurring, with whom Cordy, J., joined. In a civil action arising from the termination of the plaintiff from his employment, the Superior Court judge properly dismissed the plaintiff’s claim of defamation, where the plaintiff did not allege that the defendant employer had published to anyone a statement that the plaintiff fraudulently had obtained money from the employer. [37-38] Civil action commenced in the Superior Court Department on February 8, 2010. A motion to dismiss was heard by Patrick F. Brady, J. The Supreme Judicial Court on its own initiative transferred the case from the Appeals Court. Marc S. Alpert for the plaintiff. James J. Rooney for the defendant. The following submitted briefs for amici curiae: John Pagliaro & Martin J. Newhouse for New England Legal Foundation & another. J. Lynn Milinazzo-Gaudet for Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination. Rebecca G. Pontikes, Jonathan J. Margolis, & Beth R. Myers for National Employment Lawyers Association, Massachusetts Chapter, & others. Matthew Segal, Sarah Wunsch, Anne Josephson, & Richard S. Loftus for American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts & others. Janet Steckel Lundberg for Women’s Bar Association of Massachusetts. Martha Coakley, Attorney General, & Joshua D. Jacobson & Gabrielle Viator, Assistant Attorneys General, for the Commonwealth. Botsford, J. The Commonwealth’s antidiscrimination statute, G. L. c. 151B, § 4 (16), bars employment discrimination on the basis of handicap. This case presents the question whether the statute bars an employer from discriminating against its employee based on the handicap of a person with whom the employee associates. We answer that, in the circumstances of this case, it does. Background. The plaintiff, Marc Flagg, appeals from the dismissal of his second amended complaint (complaint) against his former employer, the defendant, AliMed, Inc. (AliMed). The complaint contained claims of defamation and of employment discrimination in violation of G. L. c. 151B (c. 151B). We recite the pertinent facts alleged in the complaint. By February, 2008, the plaintiff had worked for AliMed for approximately eighteen years, and had received good job performance reviews. As an employee, the plaintiff received a salary and benefits, including family medical insurance, and an implied term of his employment was that AliMed would not terminate him because a family member developed a serious medical condition that involved considerable medical expense. On December 7, 2007, the plaintiff’s wife underwent surgery for removal of a brain tumor, and thereafter was receiving rehabilitative care. As a result, the plaintiff became responsible for caring for the couple’s children, including the obligation to pick up his daughter from school — a task that required him to be absent from work from about 2:55 p.m. until about 3:20 p.m. on certain days. The plaintiff’s manager at AliMed told him to take the time necessary to do what he had to do to care for his family. When the plaintiff left work to pick up his daughter on various days between December 27, 2007, and January 15, 2008,* ** he did not “punch out” — either when he went to pick up his daughter or after he had returned to work and was leaving at the end of the day. His manager knew the plaintiff was not punching out, and did not say anything to him about this practice. On February 4, 2008, however, AliMed terminated the plaintiff’s employment, proffering as its reason the fact that the plaintiff had failed to punch out on certain days when he left to pick up his daughter and therefore was being paid for hours that he had not actually worked. AliMed’s proffered reason for the termination was false: the real reason the plaintiff was terminated was that his wife had a very serious and expensive medical condition that rendered her totally disabled, and for which Ali-Med, through its health plan, was financially responsible. The February 4 employment termination took place at a time when the plaintiff’s wife was again a hospital inpatient because of a recurrence of the brain tumor, and the termination resulted in the immediate cancellation of the plaintiff’s health insurance and an initial denial of unemployment benefits. As a consequence, the plaintiff had to deplete his retirement plan funds and all his savings and suffered mental anguish. In addition, AliMed’s false reasons, and allegation that the plaintiff fraudulently was claiming that he had worked certain hours when he had not and thereby obtained money to which he was not entitled, “became known amongst fellow workers and the community at large,” likely leading people who learned of this allegation and who did not know him to conclude that the plaintiff “had engaged in serious deliberate misconduct” when in fact he had not done so. AliMed moved to dismiss the plaintiff’s complaint pursuant to Mass. R. Civ. P. 12 (b) (6), as amended, 365 Mass. 754 (1974), and to strike portions of the complaint under Mass. R. Civ. P. 12 (f), as amended, 365 Mass. 754 (1974). After a hearing, a judge in the Superior Court allowed the motion to dismiss, ruling that (1) the claim of defamation was not pleaded adequately; and (2) the plaintiff’s claim of employment discrimination did not state a claim on which relief could be granted: “the theory that [AliMed] fired plaintiff because his wife was handicapped is not recognized in the Commonwealth.” A judgment of dismissal entered on December 28, 2010, and the plaintiff timely filed an appeal in the Appeals Court. We transferred the appeal to this court on our own motion. Discussion. 1. Standard of review. In reviewing the correctness of the judge’s decision allowing AliMed’s motion to dismiss the plaintiff’s complaint for failure to state a claim, see Mass. R. Civ. P. 12 (b) (6), we “take as true ‘the allegations of the complaint, as well as such inferences as may be drawn therefrom in the plaintiff’s favor.’ ” Marram v. Kobrick Offshore Fund, Ltd., 442 Mass. 43, 45 (2004), citing Blank v. Chelmsford Ob/Gyn, P.C., 420 Mass. 404, 407 (1995). To survive a motion to dismiss, the facts contained in the complaint, and the reasonable inferences drawn therefrom, must “ ‘plausibly suggest[]’ ... an entitlement to relief” (citation omitted). Iannacchino v. Ford Motor Co., 451 Mass. 623, 636 (2008), quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 545 (2007). We consider first the plaintiff’s claim under G. L. c. 151B, and thereafter his defamation claim. 2. Violation of c. 151B. As the motion judge implicitly recognized, the plaintiff’s claim is one of associational discrimination. The term “associational discrimination” refers to a claim that a plaintiff, although not a member of a protected class himself or herself, is the victim of discriminatory animus directed toward a third person who is a member of the protected class and with whom the plaintiff associates. See, e.g., Barrett v. Whirlpool Corp., 556 F.3d 502, 512 (6th Cir. 2009), citing Tetro v. Elliott Popham Pontiac, Oldsmobile, Buick & GMC Trucks, Inc., 173 F.3d 988, 994 (6th Cir. 1999). In substance, the c. 151B count of the complaint alleges that AliMed, the plaintiff’s employer, terminated his employment premised on discriminatory animus directed toward his handicapped wife, that is, its desire to be free from its obligation to pay for the wife’s costly medical treatment. The plaintiff’s argument is that this form of discrimination fits within the scope of c. 151B, § 4 (16) (§ 4 [16]), because it causes a direct and specific injury to the employee and represents “a formidable barrier to the full participation of an individual in the workplace,” College-Town, Div. of Interco, Inc. v. Massachusetts Comm’n Against Discrimination, 400 Mass. 156, 162 (1987), which c. 151B, § 4, is intended to prevent. We agree. As we next discuss, interpreting § 4 (16) to encompass a claim of associational discrimination finds support in the language and purpose of that section and c. 151B more generally in the longstanding and consistent interpretation given to the statute by the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (commission), and in the analogous provisions of Federal antidiscrimination statutes. Section 4 (16) provides in pertinent part that it shall be an unlawful practice, “[f]or any employer, personally or through an agent, to dismiss from employment or refuse to hire, rehire or advance in employment or otherwise discriminate against, because of his handicap, any person alleging to be a qualified handicapped person, capable of performing the essential functions of the position involved with reasonable accommodation, unless the employer can demonstrate that the accommodation required to be made to the physical or mental limitations of the person would impose an undue hardship to the employer’s business” (emphasis added). AliMed argues that the language of this section precludes the plaintiff from raising a claim of associational handicap discrimination because the handicapped person at issue is not the plaintiff — its employee —■ but the plaintiff’s wife. AliMed reads the section too narrowly. “The general and familiar rule is that a statute must be interpreted according to the intent of the Legislature ascertained from all its words construed by the ordinary and approved usage of the language, considered in connection with the cause of its enactment, the mischief or imperfection to be remedied and the main object to be accomplished.” Hanlon v. Rollins, 286 Mass. 444, 447 (1934). See, e.g., Lopez v. Commonwealth, 463 Mass. 696, 707 (2012) (interpreting c. 151B, § 4 [4A]). Accordingly, although a statute’s words are of prime importance in a court’s effort to discern legislative intent, see, e.g., Lowery v. Klemm, 446 Mass. 572, 577 (2006), the words must be evaluated in the context of the overarching purpose of the statute itself. We begin, therefore, with the objectives and purposes of c. 151B. Chapter 151B was enacted in 1946 to provide remedies for employment discrimination, a practice viewed as harmful to “our democratic institutions” and a “hideous evil” that needs to be “extirpated.” The Legislature recognized that employment discrimination is often subtle and indirect, and that it may manifest itself “by so many devious and various means that no single corrective rule can be applied to prevent the injustices committed.” And the Legislature determined that workplace discrimination harmed not only the targeted individuals but the entire social fabric. See Gasior v. Massachusetts Gen. Hosp., 446 Mass. 645, 653-654 (2006), quoting Stonehill College v. Massachusetts Comm’n Against Discrimination, 441 Mass. 549, 563, cert. denied sub nom. Wilfert Bros. Realty Co. v. Massachusetts Comm’n Against Discrimination, 543 U.S. 979 (2004) (recognizing that in context of c. 151B, punitive damages intended “as not merely vindicating personal rights, but comprising part of a scheme to vindicate a ‘broader public interest in eradicating systemic discrimination’ ”). The remedial aims of the statute are “only broadly set out.” Dahill v. Police Dep’t of Boston, 434 Mass. 233, 239-240 (2001) (Dahill), quoting Rock v. Massachusetts Comm’n Against Discrimination, 384 Mass. 198, 204 (1981). The Legislature gave the commission comprehensive agency powers to effectuate the statute’s aims, and expressly directed that c. 151B “be construed liberally for the accomplishment of its purposes.” G. L. c. 151B, § 9. The statutory provisions that proscribe employment discrimination based on handicap — § 4 (16) and derivatively c. 151B, § 1 (16), (17), and (19) — were added primarily in 1983. See St. 1983, c. 533, §§ 2, 6. They were enacted three years after the Legislature ratified an amendment to the Massachusetts Constitution prohibiting all discrimination based on handicap. See art. 114 of the Amendments to the Massachusetts Constitution. Read against the backdrop of this constitutional amendment as well as the command of c. 151B, § 9, to interpret the statute liberally in order to effectuate its remedial purposes, these provisions can only be understood as establishing an expansive, categorical prohibition against discrimination based on handicap in the workplace generally. When an employer subjects an otherwise satisfactory employee to adverse employment decisions premised on hostility toward the handicapped condition of the employee’s spouse, it is treating the employee as if he were handicapped himself — that is, predicated on discriminatory animus, the employer treats the spouse’s handicap as a characteristic bearing on the employee’s fitness for his job. The employee is thereby subjected to the type of “prejudice, stereotypes, or unfounded fear” relating to handicapped individuals that c. 151B, § 4 (16), seeks to protect against. See Cox v. New England Tel. & Tel. Co., 414 Mass. 375, 383-384 (1993), quoting School Bd. of Nassau County v. Arline, 480 U.S. 273, 287 (1987). Cf. Dahill, 434 Mass. at 240-241. Reading the statutory language broadly in light of its remedial purpose, and in order best to effectuate the Legislature’s intent, we think that the concept of associational discrimination also furthers the more general purposes of c. 151B as a wide-ranging law, “seeking] . . . removal of artificial, arbitrary, and unnecessary barriers to full participation in the workplace” that are based on discrimination. College-Town, Div. of Interco, Inc. v. Massachusetts Comm’n Against Discrimination, 400 Mass. 156, 162 (1987). See Ayash v. Dana-Farber Cancer Inst., 443 Mass. 367, 391-392, cert. denied sub nom. Globe Newspaper Co., Inc. v. Ayash, 546 U.S. 927 (2005) (c. 151B is “comprehensive statute” and was enacted “to provide judicial and administrative remedies for destructive acts of discrimination in the workplace”). See also Lopez v. Commonwealth, 463 Mass. at 707. Significantly, c. 151B expressly gives standing to seek relief to “[a]ny person claiming to be aggrieved” by practices made unlawful by the statute (emphasis added). G. L. c. 151B, § 5. This section, using the same language as a cognate provision in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000e et seq. (2006 & Supp. V 2011) (Title VII), offers strong support for the conclusion that c. 151B’s protections against workplace discrimination were intended to cover all those adversely affected, whether or not they are the direct target of the proscribed discriminatory animus. Cf. Thompson v. North Am. Stainless, LP, 131 S. Ct. 863, 869-870 (2011) (interpreting phrase “person claiming to be aggrieved” in Title VII, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-5[b] [2006]). We return to the language of § 4 (16). The section declares it unlawful for an employer to discriminate against, “because of his handicap, any person alleging to be a qualified handicapped person.” The key term in § 4 (16) is “handicap.” It is defined in relevant part to mean “(a) a physical or mental impairment which substantially limits one or more major Ufe activities of a person; (b) a record of having such impairment; or (c) being regarded as having such impairment’ (emphasis added). G. L. c. 151B, § 1 (17). The third prong of the definition “protects those persons who, whether actually impaired or not, may be the victims of stereotypic assumptions, myths, and fears regarding such limitations.” Dahill, 434 Mass. at 241. We read this broad definition, and especially its third prong, as a signal that the Legislature intended § 4 (16) to prevent an employer’s animus against disabihty from adversely affecting not just those employees with actual handicaps but essentially all members of its workforce, because every employee theoretically has the potential for “being regarded” by the employer as having an impairment. When an employer takes adverse action against its employee because of his spouse’s impairment, it is targeting the employee as the direct victim of its animus, inflicting punishment for exactly the same reason and in exactly the same way as if the employee were handicapped himself. In other words, an employee treated in such a manner by his employer suffers precisely the same type of discrimination as an employee whom the employer directly but incorrectly “regard[s] as” being handicapped. In light of the Legislature’s expansive definition of “handicap,” and keeping in mind its command concerning liberal construction of the statute, see c. 151B, § 9, we conclude that the language of § 4 (16) is properly read to accommodate the concept of handicap discrimination based on association. Importantly, our interpretation of § 4 (16)’s language is one that the commission itself has adopted and consistently followed. “The primary responsibility to determine the scope of [c. 151B] has been entrusted to the [commission], not to the courts,” Rock v. Massachusetts Comm’n Against Discrimination, 384 Mass. 198, 206 (1981), and we generally afford the commission’s interpretation of c. 151B’s provisions substantial deference. See, e.g., Dahill, supra at 239. See also, e.g., Zoning Bd. Of Appeals of Amesbury v. Housing Appeals Comm., 457 Mass. 748, 759-760 (2010). For over thirty years, the commission, through its decisions, has interpreted c. 151B, § 4, to protect against employment discrimination based on association, including associational discrimination based on handicap. See, e.g., Dittbenner v. Hopeo Auto Parts, Inc., 11 Mass. Discrimination L. Rep. 1139 (1989) (person aggrieved due to association with disabled individual has standing to bring claim under c. 151B before commission). This longstanding interpretation of § 4 (16) by the commission offers “illuminating” guidance to us, see Dahill, 434 Mass. at 239, and we accord it the deference to which it is due. It is also significant that analogous Federal antidiscrimination statutes, Title VII and the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, 29 U.S.C. §§ 701 et seq. (2006 & Supp. V 2011) (Rehabilitation Act), have been interpreted to reach and cover claims of associational discrimination despite a lack of a specific reference in the statutory language. See Wheatley v. American Tel. & Tel. Co., 418 Mass. 394, 397 (1994) (“It is our practice to apply Federal case law construing the Federal anti-discrimination statutes in interpreting G. L. c. 151B”). Title VII focuses on discrimination in employment, and “share[s] substantial common ground” with c. 151B. See Massachusetts Bay Transp. Auth. v. Massachusetts Comm’n Against Discrimination, 450 Mass. 327, 337-338 (2008). While Title VII do
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