Banga v. Kanios

Background

Navjeet Singh Banga was a part-time first-year law student at John F. Kennedy University Law during the 2015–2016 academic year. He took Torts and Contracts, the only letter-graded courses in which he enrolled, and failed both. His cumulative grade-point average was 63, below the school’s stated threshold for continued enrollment, and the school disqualified him.

Before enrolling, Banga had not received disability accommodations at his undergraduate or master’s institution. In October 2015, he applied for accommodations through the university’s Office of Accessibility Services. His doctor recommended extra time for exams. The university granted double time, permission to stand and walk during exams, priority registration, and multimedia textbooks. Banga signed an accommodation letter that stated students who were dissatisfied could appeal, but he did not appeal that letter.

Banga alleged that he also requested, or told exam proctors he needed, a quieter and more private testing room. The university disputed that account. Banga took his midterms and finals in rooms within the accessibility-services offices, but he failed both exams in both courses. After the university disqualified him, he claimed that inadequate accommodations caused his poor performance. He also alleged that university staff retaliated against him when staff threatened to call campus security as he tried to deliver a civil-rights complaint to the university president’s office.

The operative complaint asserted disability discrimination under the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Rehabilitation Act, and California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act; retaliation under the Americans with Disabilities Act; unfair business practices; and breach of contract. The contract theories concerned a possible refund of summer tuition and an alleged failure to investigate his accusation that Professor Chris Kainos discriminated against him.

Summary-judgment analysis

Summary judgment is a procedure that allows a court to resolve claims without a trial when no genuine dispute over an important fact requires a jury’s decision. The court considered Banga’s late-filed exhibits because they were only one day late, the defendants had submitted nearly 1,000 pages of exhibits, and Banga was representing himself. The court also considered factual portions of Banga’s declaration, while leaving credibility questions for the factfinder.

For the disability-discrimination claims, the court found genuine disputes about whether Banga requested a quiet, private room as an accommodation. His March 8, 2016 email requested a room on the left side of the accessibility-services entrance, and his declaration said he had explained his reasons earlier and repeated them to proctors. The court also found disputes about whether the requested accommodation was reasonable and whether Banga could have met the university’s academic standards with that accommodation. Evidence that he passed credit/no-credit classes and several letter-graded undergraduate classes was sufficient at this stage; the court rejected the defendants’ position that he had to show he had passed a letter-graded law-school class, because Torts and Contracts were the only such classes he took.

The court concluded that these disputes also created a factual dispute about whether Banga’s disqualification was because of his disability. The court therefore denied summary judgment on his Americans with Disabilities Act and Rehabilitation Act claims. Because the Unruh Civil Rights Act and unfair-business-practices claims were derivative of those disability claims, the court also denied summary judgment on those claims.

The court granted summary judgment for the defendants on the retaliation claim. Banga’s attempt to deliver a disability complaint was protected activity, and the parties did not dispute a causal connection between that activity and the request that he leave the president’s office. But the court held that merely asking him to leave a private office, without using force, was unlikely to discourage a reasonable person from filing an Americans with Disabilities Act complaint. The staff threatened to call campus security but did not do so, and Banga filed his complaint two days later.

On the breach-of-contract claims, the court found a genuine dispute about whether John F. Kennedy University failed to refund Banga’s summer 2016 tuition. The university’s policies and letters allegedly promised a refund after disqualification. Although the university documented an intent to issue a refund, the record did not show that the refund was actually made, and Banga declared that he never received it. The court therefore denied summary judgment on the tuition-refund theory.

The court granted summary judgment on the theory that Barbieri failed to investigate Kainos. The catalog cited by Banga expressly stated that it was not a contract or offer to contract, and Banga could not identify a specific promise requiring a different investigation. In any event, the court found that Barbieri investigated the petition, referred it to the Academic Standards Committee, and that Kainos recused himself before the committee reviewed and rejected the petition.

Administrative motions and disposition

The court granted Banga’s motions to seal exhibits containing medical, financial, or personal information, including disability-application materials, a doctor’s letter, accommodation documents, and student-loan information. The court denied Banga’s motion for sanctions, finding no basis to exclude the defendants’ exhibits for alleged fabrication or discovery misconduct.

Judge Richard Seeborg’s final disposition was that the defendants’ summary-judgment motion was granted in part and denied in part. It was granted on the retaliation claim and on the investigation-based breach-of-contract theory. It was denied on the remaining breach-of-contract theory involving the tuition refund, each disability-discrimination claim, and the unfair-business-practices claim. Banga’s sealing motions were granted, and his sanctions motion was denied.