Alvarez v. Middletown

Excerpt

The plaintiff sought to recover damages from the defendant city for employ- ment discrimination pursuant to the Connecticut Fair Employment Prac- tices Act (§ 46a-51 et seq.) following his resignation from his employment after he was notified by the defendant that he was going to be discharged. The plaintiff, a Hispanic American citizen of Puerto Rican descent, who was employed as a probationary police officer by the defendant and was seeking a position as a police officer with the defendant's police department, filed a two count complaint, alleging that the defendant, in discharging him, had discriminated against him on the basis of national origin and race. The defendant filed a motion for summary judgment and submitted uncontroverted documentary proof to substantiate its proffered legitimate, nondiscriminatory justification for deciding to dis- charge the plaintiff, namely, the plaintiff's deficient performance throughout his field training and probationary period. The trial court granted the defendant's motion for summary judgment and rendered judgment in favor of the defendant, from which the plaintiff appeal to this court. Held that the trial court properly rendered summary judgment in favor of the defendant, as the plaintiff failed to demonstrate the existence of a genuine issue of material fact as to whether the defendant's nondiscriminatory justification for his discharge was a pretext for unlaw- ful discrimination on the basis of national origin and race: although the plaintiff asserted that the defendant did not discipline other officers who had performed deficiently in the same manner that he had been disciplined, he did not produce any evidence to substantiate that asser- tion, and the defendant presented contrary evidence that it had dis- charged a Caucasian officer during his probationary period due to that officer's failure to meet the police department's expectations and to properly document reports in accordance with department require- ments; more