Filed: Aug. 24, 2012
Latest Update: Mar. 02, 2020
Summary: UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 12-1012 ANGELA D. WALTON, Plaintiff - Appellant, v. NORTH CAROLINA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE AND CONSUMER SERVICES; ROBERT N. BROGDEN, JR., Defendants - Appellees. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina, at Raleigh. Louise W. Flanagan, District Judge. (5:09-cv-00302-FL) Submitted: August 17, 2012 Decided: August 24, 2012 Before KING, WYNN, and FLOYD, Circuit Judges. Affirmed by
Summary: UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 12-1012 ANGELA D. WALTON, Plaintiff - Appellant, v. NORTH CAROLINA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE AND CONSUMER SERVICES; ROBERT N. BROGDEN, JR., Defendants - Appellees. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina, at Raleigh. Louise W. Flanagan, District Judge. (5:09-cv-00302-FL) Submitted: August 17, 2012 Decided: August 24, 2012 Before KING, WYNN, and FLOYD, Circuit Judges. Affirmed by u..
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UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 12-1012
ANGELA D. WALTON,
Plaintiff - Appellant,
v.
NORTH CAROLINA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE AND CONSUMER
SERVICES; ROBERT N. BROGDEN, JR.,
Defendants - Appellees.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern
District of North Carolina, at Raleigh. Louise W. Flanagan,
District Judge. (5:09-cv-00302-FL)
Submitted: August 17, 2012 Decided: August 24, 2012
Before KING, WYNN, and FLOYD, Circuit Judges.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
David G. Schiller, SCHILLER & SCHILLER, PLLC, Raleigh, North
Carolina; Luther D. Starling, Jr., N. Leo Daughtry, Kelly K.
Daughtry, DAUGHTRY, WOODARD, LAWRENCE & STARLING, Smithfield,
North Carolina, for Appellant. I. Faison Hicks, Anne J. Brown,
NORTH CAROLINA DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Raleigh, North Carolina,
for Appellee North Carolina Department of Agriculture and
Consumer Services.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Angela D. Walton appeals the district court’s order
granting summary judgment to her former employer, the North
Carolina Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services
(“the Department”), on her claim for sex discrimination creating
a hostile work environment under Title VII of the Civil Rights
Act of 1964, as amended (“Title VII”), 42 U.S.C.A. §§ 2000e to
2000e-17 (West 2003 & Supp. 2012), and remanding to state court
her claims under North Carolina law against her former
supervisor, Defendant Robert N. Brogden, Jr. On appeal, Walton
challenges the district court’s grant of summary judgment to the
Department on her claim under Title VII. Finding no reversible
error, we affirm.
We review a district court’s grant of summary judgment
de novo, drawing reasonable inferences in the light most
favorable to the non-moving party. PBM Prods., LLC v. Mead
Johnson & Co., 639 F.3d 111, 119 (4th Cir. 2011). Summary
judgment is proper “if the movant shows that there is no genuine
dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to
judgment as a matter of law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). “Only
disputes over facts that might affect the outcome of the suit
under the governing law will properly preclude the entry of
summary judgment.” Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc.,
477 U.S.
242, 248 (1986). To withstand a motion for summary judgment,
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the non-moving party must produce competent evidence to reveal
the existence of a genuine issue of material fact for trial.
See Thompson v. Potomac Elec. Power Co., 312 F.3d 645, 649
(4th Cir. 2002) (“Conclusory or speculative allegations do not
suffice, nor does a mere scintilla of evidence in support of
[the non-moving party’s] case.” (internal quotation marks
omitted)).
To prevail on her Title VII claim for a hostile work
environment, Walton was required to establish the following four
elements: (1) “unwelcome conduct,” (2) based on her gender,
(3) that was “sufficiently pervasive or severe to alter the
conditions of employment and to create a hostile work
environment,” and (4) some basis for imputing liability to her
employer. Matvia v. Bald Head Island Mgmt., Inc., 259 F.3d 261,
266 (4th Cir. 2001). The district court assumed without
deciding that Walton could establish the first three elements of
her hostile work environment claim but granted summary judgment
to the Department on the fourth element in light of the
Ellerth/Faragher affirmative defense to liability. Faragher v.
City of Boca Raton,
524 U.S. 775 (1998); Burlington Indus.,
Inc. v. Ellerth,
524 U.S. 742 (1998). The defense permits an
employer to avoid strict liability under Title VII for a
supervisor’s sexual harassment of an employee if no tangible
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employment action was taken against the employee. Matvia,
259 F.3d at 266.
To prevail under the defense, the employer must
establish that it “exercised reasonable care to prevent and
correct promptly any sexually harassing behavior, and . . . that
the plaintiff employee unreasonably failed to take advantage of
any preventative or corrective opportunities provided by the
employer or to avoid harm otherwise.” Id. at 266-67 (internal
quotation marks omitted). An employer’s “dissemination of an
effective anti-harassment policy provides compelling proof that
[it] has exercised reasonable care to prevent and correct sexual
harassment.”
Id. at 268 (internal quotation marks omitted).
However, evidence showing that the employer implemented the
policy “in bad faith” or was “deficient in enforcing the policy
will rebut this proof.” Id.; see Barrett v. Applied Radiant
Energy Corp.,
240 F.3d 262, 266 (4th Cir. 2001) (stating that an
employee may make her rebuttal showing by establishing that her
“employer adopted or administered an anti-harassment policy in
bad faith or that the policy was otherwise defective or
dysfunctional” (internal quotation marks omitted)).
Walton challenges the district court’s determination
that the Department exercised reasonable care to prevent
sexually harassing behavior, arguing that its anti-harassment
policy was deficient because some of her co-workers did not
4
understand it. That Walton’s co-workers may not have understood
the policy, however, does not establish that Walton herself did
not understand it. Additionally, it is clear from the record
that the policy defined unlawful workplace harassment —
including sexual harassment — and how and to whom such
harassment could be reported and that Walton attended a training
course at which she received instruction on how to report
unlawful workplace harassment. Walton neither points to any
language in the policy rendering it unclear or difficult to
follow nor specifies how the policy could have been made
clearer. In view of this record, Walton cannot show reversible
error in the district court’s grant of summary judgment to the
Department by claiming that other employees did not understand
the policy. Accordingly, her claim that the policy was
deficient must fail.
We also reject as meritless Walton’s appellate
arguments challenging the district court’s determinations that
the Department exercised reasonable care to correct promptly any
sexually harassing behavior and that she unreasonably failed to
take advantage of any preventative or corrective opportunities
provided by the Department. Her arguments are premised on
assertions that are conclusory, unexplained, and made without
record support.
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Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s judgment.
We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal
contentions are adequately presented in the materials before the
court and argument would not aid the decisional process.
AFFIRMED
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