Osekavage v. Sam's East, Inc.

Background

Kamila Osekavage sued Sam’s East, Inc., Walmart, Inc., and Stephen Orloski under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the New York Human Rights Law. She alleged that she was terminated because of her sex and because she engaged in protected activity by complaining internally about unequal treatment of male and female managers.

Osekavage had worked for Sam’s since 2004 and became the Club Manager of the Fishkill, New York Club in 2017. In June 2018, Orloski issued her two written disciplinary actions for job performance. On June 25, 2018, she complained to Cedric Clark that Orloski did not treat male and female Club Managers equally. Sam’s investigated the complaint and found it unsubstantiated.

Osekavage filed a second ethics complaint in August 2018, alleging that further discipline would be retaliation for her earlier complaint. Orloski issued her a third written disciplinary action on August 23, 2018. After November tours in which Orloski and Clark identified problems at the Fishkill Club, Osekavage was terminated on November 5, 2018, and replaced by a male Club Manager.

Summary-judgment standard

The defendants moved for summary judgment under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56. Summary judgment is appropriate only when there is no genuine dispute about a material fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. The court does not decide disputed facts or weigh competing evidence at this stage; it asks whether a reasonable jury could rule for the nonmoving party.

Sex-discrimination claim

The defendants did not dispute that Osekavage established the initial requirements for a sex-discrimination claim. They argued that her termination was based on legitimate performance deficiencies. The court agreed that performance problems were a legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason on the face of the motion, so Osekavage had to present evidence that this reason was a pretext—that is, a false explanation masking discrimination.

The court found genuine factual disputes about pretext. Osekavage identified Donnelly and Angulo as male Club Manager comparators who received discipline for performance deficiencies but were not terminated. The record also included evidence that Angulo continued to have performance issues without receiving another written disciplinary action. Notes App data and other evidence could support a finding that these male managers had deficiencies comparable to those cited for Osekavage’s termination.

The court also considered evidence that Osekavage was replaced by a male manager and testimony or statements from other female employees expressing the belief that Orloski treated women differently from men. Viewing the evidence as a whole, the court concluded that a reasonable jury could find that the defendants’ performance explanation was pretextual. The court rejected resolving the claim through the “same actor” inference—the circumstance that Orloski had promoted Osekavage before participating in the decision to terminate her—because that inference did not eliminate the factual dispute about pretext.

Retaliation claim

For the Title VII retaliation claim, the court explained that Osekavage had to show that retaliation was a but-for cause of the adverse action, meaning that she would not have been terminated without her protected complaints. The court recognized that her first two disciplinary actions occurred before her first internal discrimination complaint, but it found the overall sequence significant: she had previously received little formal discipline, filed her first complaint on the day of the second write-up, received a third write-up about two months later, and was terminated about two months after that.

The court held that the timing, together with the evidence of disparate treatment, could allow a reasonable jury to find that the defendants’ stated reasons were pretextual and that retaliation was a but-for cause of the termination. Whether that causal requirement was met required weighing disputed facts and therefore could not be resolved on summary judgment.

New York Human Rights Law claims

The court stated that the New York Human Rights Law claims were generally governed by the same standards as the Title VII claims. Because factual disputes required a trial on the federal discrimination and retaliation claims, the court found factual disputes on the state-law claims as well.

Disposition

Judge Philip M. Halpern denied the defendants’ motion for summary judgment. The court stated that Osekavage’s claims would proceed to trial and directed the parties to complete specified pretrial filings and attend a pretrial conference.