ROBERT G. JAMES, District Judge.
Before the Court is a Motion for Summary Judgment [Doc. No. 13] filed by Defendants Gardner Denver Thomas, Inc. ("Gardner Denver") and Erick Stoor. Plaintiff Michael Harris does not oppose the motion. For reasons assigned below, the motion is GRANTED.
Gardner Denver hired Harris as an employee on April 26, 2010. While employed, Harris was a member of a collective bargaining unit, which operated under a collective bargaining agreement ("CBA") between Gardner Denver and Communications Workers of America ("the Union").
On July 6, 2016, Harris was accused of peeping under the men's restroom stall at a coworker. Gardner Denver investigated and verified the accusation. Having verified the allegation and having warned Harris twice before about similar conduct, Gardner Denver found just cause to, and did, discharge Harris on July 8, 2016.
Recording the findings of the investigation on a Disciplinary Action Notice form, Kayce Creighton, Human Resources Generalist, wrote: "Mr. Harris was in the restroom attempting to look under the stall at another employee. This immoral and sexual deviant behavior is unacceptable and will not be tolerated. Gardner Denver makes every effort for a safe work environment and this behavior is a direct violation." [Doc. No. 13-4].
Under Articles 3 and 8 of the CBA, Gardner Denver may discharge an employee for "just cause." [Doc. No. 13-3, pp. 6, 9]. Article 8 provides, "The question of whether `just cause' exists for the discipline shall be subject to the grievance and arbitration procedure provided herein." Id. at 9. Under Article 21, "an employee who is discharged must process his/her grievance" through the first three tiers. Id. at 24. Following that, a discharged employee must submit his grievance to arbitration. Id. at 23.
Harris processed his grievances—which he described as "false accusations of sexual harassment" and "discrimination"—through the third tier of the grievance process. [Doc. No. 13-5]. On July 14, 2016, Debra Priebe, Gardner Denver's Manager of Human Resources, denied Harris's grievance at the third tier, noting, "Termination will stand . . . ." Id.
There is no evidence, however, that Plaintiff asked the Union to submit his grievances to arbitration within the requisite time period. Article 22 of the CBA provides: "The Union, after properly utilizing all steps of the Grievance Procedure and desiring to submit a matter to arbitration, shall notify the Company in writing within the aforementioned thirty (30) calendar days." [Doc. No. 13-3, p. 23]. The "aforementioned thirty (30) calendar days" refers to Article 21, which provides that a tier-three decision is final unless the Union notifies "the Company in writing within thirty (30) days that it desires to submit the matter to arbitration." Id. at 24. As Harris did not ask the Union to submit his grievances to arbitration, the grievances were deemed waived under the terms of the CBA. Id. at 23.
On June 30, 2017, Harris filed suit in the Fourth Judicial District Court, Parish of Ouachita, State of Louisiana, and alleged, under state law, that Defendants wrongfully terminated him, defamed him, and subjected him to emotional distress. [Doc. No. 1-2]. On July 20, 2017, Defendants removed the proceeding to this Court, grounding federal question jurisdiction on the contention that Harris's claims are preempted under the Labor Management Relations Act ("LMRA"). [Doc. No. 1].
On September 13, 2017, Defendants moved for summary judgment, arguing that Harris's claims are preempted under Section 301 of the LMRA, that Harris "cannot bring tort claims under Section 301[,]" that Harris failed to exhaust all remedies under the CBA before filing suit, and that Harris's claims are time barred. Harris did not respond to Defendants' motion or otherwise controvert Defendants' properly supported statement of material facts [Doc. No. 13-1]. Consequently, all material facts that Defendants proffer are deemed admitted. LR 56.2.
Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56(a), "[a] party may move for summary judgment, identifying each claim or defense—or the part of each claim or defense—on which summary judgment is sought. The court shall grant summary judgment 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." The moving party bears the initial burden of informing the court of the basis for its motion by identifying portions of the record which highlight the absence of genuine issues of material fact. Topalian v. Ehrmann, 954 F.2d 1125, 1132 (5th Cir. 1992); see also FED. R. CIV. P. 56(c)(1) ("A party asserting that a fact cannot be . . . disputed must support the assertion by . . . citing to particular parts of materials in the record . . . ."). Even if the motion is unopposed, the Court may not grant a motion for summary judgment unless the moving party meets its initial burden. Hetzel v. Bethlehem Steel Corp., 50 F.3d 360, 362 (5th Cir. 1995).
A fact is "material" if proof of its existence or nonexistence would affect the outcome of the lawsuit under applicable law in the case. Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248 (1986). A dispute about a material fact is "genuine" if the evidence is such that a reasonable fact finder could render a verdict for the nonmoving party. Id.
Defendants maintain that 29 U.S.C. § 185(a) ("Section 301") preempts Harris's state law claims. [Doc. No. 14, p. 10]. Addressing that Section, the Fifth Circuit thoroughly explained:
Espinoza v. Cargill Meat Sols. Corp., 622 F.3d 432, 442-43 (5th Cir. 2010).
Here, Harris alleges state law claims of wrongful discharge, defamation, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. [Doc. No. 1-2]. Harris's wrongful discharge claim is, without doubt, inextricably intertwined with consideration of the terms of the CBA. Harris does not allege that Defendants discharged him because of discriminatory or retaliatory reasons.
Harris's defamation and emotional distress claims are likewise preempted. Notably, Harris grounds his claims in the exact language that the human resources generalist used to describe the findings of her investigation: "Petitioner was in the restroom attempting to look under the stall at another employee. This immoral and sexual deviant behavior is unacceptable and will not be tolerated. Gardner Denver makes every effort for a safe work environment and this behavior is a direct violation." [C.f. Doc. Nos. 1-2, p. 5; 13-4]. In short, Harris alleges that Gardner Denver's just cause for termination amounts to defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress. To the extent Harris claims that Gardner Denver's stated reasons for discharge do not amount to "good cause," the Court must necessarily consider and interpret the CBA.
Adjudicating the defamation and emotional distress claims will also require the Court to interpret the grievance, discharge, and management provisions of the CBA. To prevail on his defamation claim Harris must demonstrate: "(1) a false and defamatory statement concerning another; (2) an unprivileged publication to a third party; (3) fault (negligence or greater) on the part of the publisher; and (4) resulting injury." Kennedy v. Sheriff of E. Baton Rouge, 935 So.2d 669, 674 (La. 2006). To prevail on his intentional infliction of emotional distress claim, Harris must demonstrate: "(1) that the conduct of the defendant was extreme and outrageous; (2) that the emotional distress suffered by the plaintiff was severe; and (3) that the defendant desired to inflict severe emotional distress or knew that severe emotional distress would be certain or substantially certain to result from his conduct." White v. Monsanto Co., 585 So.2d 1205, 1209 (La. 1991).
To adjudicate these claims, considering that Harris's grounds for the claims are the reasons Gardner Denver cited in its answer to Harris's third-tier grievance as just cause for discharging him,
As there are no genuine disputes of material fact, Harris's state law claims are preempted in favor of applying uniform principles of federal labor law. As a result, the Court must either treat Harris's claims as Section 301 claims or dismiss them as preempted. Allis-Chalmers Corp., 471 U.S. at 220.
Treating Harris's claims as Section 301 claims, they must be dismissed because he failed to exhaust the grievance procedures in the CBA. "[F]ederal labor policy requires that individual employees wishing to assert contract grievances must attempt use of the contract grievance procedure agreed upon by employer and union as the mode of redress." Republic Steel Corp. v. Maddox, 379 U.S. 650, 652 (1965); see Parham v. Carrier Corp., 9 F.3d 383, 390 (5th Cir. 1993) ("In the section 301 context, federal law ordinarily requires a plaintiff to exhaust grievance procedures established in a collective bargaining agreement before filing a claim in court."); Strachan, 768 F.2d at 704 ("The law is completely clear that employees may not resort to state tort or contract claims in substitution for their rights under the grievance procedure in a collective bargaining agreement.").
Here, it is undisputed that the CBA contains a four-tiered grievance and arbitration process
Because the time for submitting his grievances to arbitration has passed, Harris cannot exhaust the grievance and arbitration procedure, and he cannot re-file the instant claims. Considering Defendants' properly supported motion, as well as Harris's lack of opposition, the Court finds that there is no genuine dispute of material fact and that Defendants are entitled to judgment as a matter of law.
For the foregoing reasons, Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment is GRANTED, and Harris's claims are DISMISSED WITH PREJUDICE.
