Sabater v. Montefiore Medical Center

Background

Aaron Sabater worked at Montefiore Medical Center, first as a temporary Senior Accounting Clerk and later as a Billing Representative. Paperwork was submitted in 2013 and again in 2015 to move him into a permanent position, but the court described a dispute over whether that change was completed. Sabater maintained that he was treated as permanent, while the record showed that he was classified as temporary when he was terminated.

Sabater complained about his supervisor in late 2014 and later called Montefiore’s compliance hotline and spoke with Human Resources about harassment and, according to his account, discrimination. He claimed that he was reassigned to a scanning-room team after those complaints, although Montefiore disputed whether the reassignment occurred.

Montefiore was covered by a collective bargaining agreement with 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East. In 2016, Montefiore and 1199 settled a class grievance concerning the use of temporary employees beyond the agreement’s contractual limit. The settlement allowed Montefiore, in its sole discretion, to offer permanent employment to affected temporary employees and required termination of those who were not offered employment within 60 days. After Montefiore imposed a hiring freeze, Sabater was among 37 temporary employees terminated under the settlement. Sabater disputed that he was properly classified as temporary.

After his termination, Sabater contacted 1199 representatives. The union investigated, initially believed he may have been wrongly classified, and contacted the arbitrator overseeing the class grievance. The union ultimately decided not to file a formal individual grievance because it could not independently verify whether Sabater was temporary or permanent.

Legal standard

The court applied the summary-judgment standard under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56. Summary judgment is appropriate when the evidence shows no genuine dispute about an important fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment under the law. The court views the evidence favorably to the party opposing the motion, but that party must identify evidence from which a reasonable jury could rule in its favor.

1199’s motion for summary judgment

Sabater brought a hybrid claim under Section 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act. This type of claim requires proof both that the employer breached the collective bargaining agreement and that the union breached its duty of fair representation while handling the employee’s grievance.

The court held that Sabater did not provide evidence that 1199 acted arbitrarily. A union’s decision is arbitrary only when it falls far outside the range of reasonable choices and is irrational in light of the information available when the decision was made. The court found that 1199 investigated Sabater’s status, lacked documentary evidence proving that he was permanent, and took steps through the existing class grievance process to seek relief for affected workers, including Sabater. Even if the union’s judgment was wrong, that alone was not enough to establish arbitrary conduct.

The court also held that Sabater did not provide evidence that 1199 acted in bad faith. Bad faith requires an improper motive, such as fraud, dishonesty, or intentional misleading conduct. Sabater admitted that no union representative told him that his termination was being formally grieved or would go to arbitration. His evidence that he told a union organizer he wanted to be made whole did not show that the union intentionally misled him.

The court therefore granted 1199’s motion for summary judgment. It also treated as abandoned several additional arguments because Sabater did not pursue them in opposition to the motion.

Montefiore’s motion for partial summary judgment

Retaliation claims. The court granted summary judgment to Montefiore on Sabater’s retaliation claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1981 and the New York City Human Rights Law. Regarding the alleged reassignment to the scanning-room team, the court assumed for purposes of the motion that the reassignment occurred, but found no evidence that it was materially adverse: Sabater testified that the job was easier and that his pay and hours did not change. The court also granted summary judgment on claims based on alleged threats to Sabater’s and his mother’s jobs, both because threats alone were not an adverse employment action and because Sabater did not address that argument in his opposition.

The court further held that Sabater had not shown that his complaints caused his termination or that the termination was motivated even partly by retaliation. The evidence showed that he was classified as temporary when he was terminated and that the termination followed the settlement and hiring freeze. Even assuming that he should have been classified as permanent earlier, the court found no evidence that his placement on the temporary-employee list or his termination was driven by retaliatory motives. The court stated that all of Sabater’s Section 1981 and New York City Human Rights Law retaliation claims were dismissed.

State-law contract claim. The court granted Montefiore summary judgment on Sabater’s state-law breach-of-contract claim. Sabater did not identify an independent employment contract and instead argued about an alleged breach of the collective bargaining agreement. The court held that a claim based on the collective bargaining agreement was governed by, and therefore preempted by, the federal labor law, so the state-law contract claim was dismissed.

LMRA Section 301 claim against Montefiore. The court granted Montefiore summary judgment on Sabater’s hybrid Section 301 claim. Because the court had already found that 1199 did not breach its duty of fair representation, Sabater could not establish the required union-breach component of the claim against Montefiore. The court dismissed that claim.

Disposition

The court granted 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East’s motion for summary judgment and granted Montefiore Medical Center’s motion for partial summary judgment. It directed the Clerk to close the two motions and terminate 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East as a party. The order also scheduled a later telephone status conference involving Sabater and Montefiore, so the opinion does not state that every claim in the case was resolved.