Perez v. Douglas A. Collins

Background

This employment-discrimination case arises from Perez’s employment with the Department of Veterans Affairs. The opinion states that Perez alleges discrimination based on race, national origin, and age, along with unlawful retaliation. In the section describing Perez’s position, the opinion also refers to gender discrimination. Perez sought documents concerning other complaints of alleged discrimination by VA employees.

The parties met and conferred and reached an agreement on the scope of the discovery, apart from privacy concerns. The requested records concerned: (1) documents sufficient to show the reasons for, duration of, and final disposition of certain details involving VA chief nurses supervised by David Renfro, resulting from complaints, investigations, or other adverse performance-related issues from January 2018 onward; and (2) formal Equal Employment Opportunity complaints filed with the Department of Veterans Affairs from September 14, 2021, onward that name Renfro as a deciding official and involve alleged disparate treatment or retaliation based on race, national origin, age, or activity protected by Title VII, together with any final agency action.

Positions of the Parties

Perez contended that the records were important to support her discrimination and retaliation claims. She described alleged differences in her performance evaluations and disciplinary treatment, including her placement on detail and a formal admonishment, and argued that records involving Renfro could support her claim that discrimination and retaliation, rather than performance concerns, motivated those actions.

The Department of Veterans Affairs objected to producing the records without a court order. It relied on the Privacy Act and other privacy protections, and argued that the need for discovery must be balanced against the privacy rights of employees whose records were sought. The department did not concede that the documents were relevant and reserved the right to make further arguments about the admissibility of documents produced under the stipulation.

Order

The court ordered the department to produce the specified records to Perez within 14 days of the order. The order allows the department to designate produced documents as confidential under the protective order entered in the case.

The court also ordered that disclosure of privileged or protected material covered by the order would not waive attorney-client privilege, work-product protection, or other applicable protections, including the deliberative-process privilege, provided the disclosing party used procedures reasonably designed to screen out privileged materials. The order states that any such disclosure is considered unintentional, inadvertent, and compelled by the court’s order. The opinion does not decide the merits of Perez’s discrimination or retaliation claims.