Filed: May 21, 2001
Latest Update: Feb. 21, 2020
Summary: -3-, The appellant was fifth on the list, but Vélez (who also had December 28, 1995, Act No. 256 a statute that granted Moreover, he offered no evidence that the, SIF, during the same period, consummated permanent appointments, to other career positions occupied by transitory employees.
[NOT FOR PUBLICATION — NOT TO BE CITED AS PRECEDENT]
United States Court of Appeals
For the First Circuit
No. 00-1848
HECTOR NEGRON TORRES,
Plaintiff, Appellant,
v.
STATE INSURANCE FUND CORPORATION ET AL.,
Defendants, Appellees.
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF PUERTO RICO
[Hon. Gilberto Gierbolini, Senior U.S. District Judge]
Before
Torruella, Chief Judge,
Coffin, Senior Circuit Judge,
and Selya, Circuit Judge.
Jose Martinez-Custodio for appellant.
Marcelle D. Martell Jovet, with whom James W. McCartney and
Cancio, Nadal, Rivera, Díaz & Berríos were on brief, for
corporate appellee.
Leticia Casalduc Rabell, Assistant Solicitor General, Puerto
Rico Dep't of Justice, with whom Gustavo A. Gelpi, Solicitor
General, and Rosa N. Russe Garcia, Deputy Solicitor General,
were on brief, for individual appellees.
March 27, 2001
SELYA, Circuit Judge. Puerto Rico's central government
operates under a civil service system premised on the merit
principle. See 3 P.R. Laws Ann. § 1311. Career positions
ordinarily are filled according to a set protocol. Id. § 1333.
The system, however, permits temporary appointments, commonly
called transitory appointments, to career positions in specified
circumstances. See
id. § 1333(12)(a)-(f).
On June 16, 1995, hierarchs at the State Insurance Fund
(the SIF), responding to a vacancy unexpectedly created by an
injury to a career employee, granted Javier Vélez Irizarry
(Vélez) a transitory appointment as Administrative Official I
(AO) at the SIF's Utuado office. At that time, plaintiff-
appellant Héctor Negrón Torres (Negrón) held a lesser position,
Oficial Pagador Auxiliar I, in the same office. It is
undisputed that the AO position is a career position which does
not involve policymaking.
On August 19, 1996, the SIF published a hiring call for
the AO position at Utuado. The appellant seasonably applied for
the post. After the application period closed, the SIF promptly
issued a certificate of eligible candidates. See 3 P.R. Laws
Ann. § 1333 (outlining general provisions governing recruitment
and selection of career personnel); SIF Pers. Reg. § 9.8(1)
(describing procedures for certifying and selecting candidates).
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The appellant was fifth on the list, but Vélez (who also had
applied) did not make the cut. The matter languished until May
30, 1998, when the SIF conferred career status on Vélez,
retroactive to January 1, 1998.
Invoking 42 U.S.C. § 1983, the appellant sued the SIF
and two of its high-ranking officials: Oscar Ramos, the chief
administrator, and Ada Guzmán, the human resources director. He
did not challenge Vélez's original appointment as a transitory
employee, but, rather, claimed that the defendants had deprived
him of a career appointment to the AO position on the basis of
his political affiliation (the appellant is a member of the
Popular Democratic Party whereas Vélez and the individual
defendants are alleged to be members of the rival New
Progressive Party). The defendants denied liability and in due
course moved for summary judgment. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c).
After extensive briefing, the district court granted the motion.
Negrón Torres v. SIF, Civ. No. 98-2013 (D.P.R. May 9, 2000)
(unpublished). This appeal ensued.
We have frequently preached, but perhaps too
infrequently practiced, the philosophy that "when a lower court
produces a comprehensive, well-reasoned decision, an appellate
court should refrain from writing at length to no other end than
to hear its own words resonate." Lawton v. State Mut. Life
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Assur. Co., 101 F.3d 218, 220 (1st Cir. 1996). This case fits
the Lawton model. Consequently, we resist the temptation to
repastinate ground that is already well-ploughed and affirm
substantially on the basis of the lower court's thoughtful
opinion. We add only two relatively brief sets of comments.
First: Vélez's permanent appointment was not an
isolated event. As the district court explained, the
legislature enacted, and the governor signed into law on
December 28, 1995, Act No. 256 — a statute that granted
permanent career status to hundreds of transitory employees then
working for the central government. The SIF, though an arm of
the government, is organized as a separate corporation, and its
employees therefore were excluded from the benefits of Act No.
256. The evidence is uncontradicted that, in order to remedy
this perceived inequity, the SIF immediately began to explore
the possibility of granting career status to its own transitory
employees.1 The groundwork for this effort was laid well before
the SIF published the call for the AO position at Utuado, and
the effort continued unabated after the position was posted.
Progress was understandably slow: Guzmán first had to obtain a
1
More precisely put, the SIF aspired to grant career status
to those transitory employees who met Act No. 256's requirements
as to length of service and the like. The appellant does not
dispute that, as of the relevant date (January 1, 1998), Vélez
met these requirements.
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green light from the Director of Labor Relations, and then
bargain with several unions. It was not until October 26, 1996,
that the SIF and the unions were able to stipulate to converting
265 transitory employees into career employees. It took another
year to work out the arrangements with an association
representing managerial employees to convert forty-six
additional transitory employees (including Vélez) to career
status.2
The appellant has not adduced any significantly
probative evidence to show either that this agency-wide
personnel reclassification was a sham or that the AO position
was improperly included in the conversion. Absent any such
showing, the district court did not err in granting brevis
disposition in the defendants' favor. Cf. Ruiz v. Posadas de
San Juan Assocs., 124 F.3d 243, 247-48 (1st Cir. 1997)
(explaining that in order to make out a case of discrimination
in the context of changes made pursuant to a company-wide
personnel policy, the plaintiff must show that the policy itself
was either a sham or discriminatorily applied to her).
2
The appellant makes much of the fact that the AO
appointment process stalled for upwards of a year and a half.
He offered no evidence, however, of the time typically taken to
fill such positions. Moreover, he offered no evidence that the
SIF, during the same period, consummated permanent appointments
to other career positions occupied by transitory employees.
-6-
Second: The appellant hinges virtually his entire case
on the contrast between his party affiliation and Vélez's. The
law is crystal clear, however, that proving a causal link
between a challenged personnel action and an asserted political
animus requires more than merely juxtaposing a person's
political affiliation with the fact that he arguably was treated
unfairly. See Correa-Martinez v. Arrillaga-Belendez, 903 F.2d
49, 58 (1st Cir. 1990). By the same token, the fact that those
charged with making personnel decisions are affiliated with a
political party different than an unsuccessful aspirant's,
without more, will not suffice to show political discrimination
and thereby forestall summary judgment. See, e.g., Figueroa-
Serrano v. Ramos-Alverio,
221 F.3d 1, 7-8 (1st Cir. 2000);
Kauffman v. P.R. Tel. Co.,
841 F.2d 1169, 1172 (1st Cir. 1988).
The charge of political discrimination is particularly
incongruous here. While the appellant claims to be an active
member of the Popular Democratic Party, there is not a shred of
evidence that either of the decisionmakers — Ramos or Guzmán —
knew as much. Thus, the claim that they discriminated against
the appellant because of his party membership cannot survive
scrutiny. See López-Carrasquillo v. Rubianes, 230 F.3d 409, 414
(1st Cir. 2000) (noting that speculative assertions regarding
political discrimination are not enough to withstand a Rule 56
-7-
motion); Rivera-Cotto v. Rivera, 38 F.3d 611, 613-14 (1st Cir.
1994) (similar).
We need go no further. 3 While we can empathize with
the frustrations of a civil servant who earns a place on a list
of eligibles for a better job only to have the competition
aborted by an across-the-board reclassification, there is no
principled way to say, on this record, that political animus
played a part. Hence, for the reasons stated in the district
court's meticulous opinion, as augmented by our decurtate
comments, we affirm the judgment below.
Affirmed.
3We note that the appellant, who was merely one of several
individuals on the eligibles' list, has a decidedly tenuous
claim to the AO position. Because the case is easily resolved
on other grounds, however, we do not pursue this apparent
weakness.
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