Dubnick v. Firestone Tire & Rubber Co. of California

355 F. Supp. 138, 5 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 782
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. New York
DecidedMarch 1, 1973
Docket71 C 1599
StatusPublished
Cited by18 cases

This text of 355 F. Supp. 138 (Dubnick v. Firestone Tire & Rubber Co. of California) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Dubnick v. Firestone Tire & Rubber Co. of California, 355 F. Supp. 138, 5 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 782 (E.D.N.Y. 1973).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

NEAHER, District Judge.

Plaintiff, a former employee of Firestone Tire and Rubber Company of California (“Firestone”), now residing and employed in this District, commenced this action under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (“Act”), 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq., on December 10, 1971. On the previous day, December 9, he had commenced an identical action in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. 1 Both actions were instituted in order to protect plaintiff’s right to sue “in the appropriate Federal District Court” within 30 days of receipt of notice from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). Firestone has moved pursuant to Rule 12(b)(3), F.R.Civ.P., to dismiss this action for improper venue or, alternatively, to transfer it pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1404 to the Northern District of California because Firestone, its witnesses and the relevant records are concededly within that District.

The complaint and annexed exhibits contain the following facts which are deemed uncontroverted for purposes of this motion. Firestone, a corporation engaged in an industry affecting commerce, had employed plaintiff in its Salinas, California, facility from February 1967 until discharging him on March 9, 1970. He was originally hired as a safety inspector, but in July 1968 was promoted to Supervisor, Factory Employment, the position he held at the time of his discharge.

On May 22, 1970, plaintiff; then still residing in California, filed written charges with EEOC in San Francisco, alleging he had been unlawfully discharged because he opposed Firestone’s policies and practices which he felt were discriminatory against blacks. 2 EEOC, as required by the Act, first referred the charges to the Fair Employment Practice Commission of the State of California. On June 22, 1970, however, plaintiff’s charges were formally filed with EEOC, whose San Francisco district office subsequently conducted an investigation reflected in its Regional Director’s Findings of Fact dated December 16, 1970 (Complaint, Exh. B). The Regional Director found inter alia that plaintiff “was not discharged for the reasons stated by” Firestone; and that the latter’s “failure to enforce its equal employment policy has resulted in Blacks not being hired into positions of responsibility.”

On November 10, 1971 EEOC’s San Francisco office advised plaintiff, who had meanwhile obtained other employment in New York, that a satisfactory settlement with Firestone could not be reached. A notice of right-to-sue was accordingly sent to his New York attorney on the same date. 3 Thereafter *140 plaintiff commenced the California action and this action to enjoin Firestone from continuing its alleged discriminatory policies and practices, to compel plaintiff’s reinstatement in his former position or its equivalent, and to recover compensatory damages of $500,000 and punitive damages in like amount.

Defendant contends dismissal of this action is mandated by special venue provisions of the Act that clearly define and limit the judicial districts in which action may be brought. Section 2000e-5(f) specifies three optional venue districts and a fourth alternative if the employer cannot be found in any of the first three. 4 They are:

(1) “ . . . the State in which the unlawful employment practice is alleged to have been committed. tf • • t
(2) “ . . . the judicial district in which the employment records . are maintained. . . ”
(3) “ . . . the judicial district in which the plaintiff would have worked but for the alleged unlawful employment practice. . . ”, or
(4) “ . . . if the [employer] is not found within [(1), (2) or (3)] such an action may be brought within the judicial district in which the [employer] has his principal office.”

The complaint and annexed EEOC exhibits clearly show that the Northern District of California is a district which satisfies all venue criteria specified in (1), (2) and (3 above. Plaintiff com-cedes that “defendant’s alleged unlawful employment practices did unquestionably occur within the venue of the District Court of the Northern District of the State of California.” 5 It is also the district where “[t]he employment records relevant to such allegedly unlawful practice are maintained” and where “[t]he defendant may be found” with respect to Salinas, California, the place of plaintiff’s employment by Firestone. 6 The parties have also stipulated as a fact that Firestone’s “principal office is in Akron, Ohio,” supra n. 6.

This district, on the other hand, satisfies none of the Act’s venue conditions unless the court accepts plaintiff’s invitation, supported by EEOC as amicus, to read into the complaint facts which are not alleged and insert into the Act provisions never placed there by Congress. Thus plaintiff’s opposing affidavit asserts that he sought new employment in California after his .discharge but was unsuccessful because of unfavorable reference letters Firestone sent to prospective employers. The same thing occurred, he states, when he sought employment in the New York-New Jersey area. He obtained his present job, he avers, only because he did not list Firestone as a reference.

None of the foregoing asserted facts appears in or can fairly be inferred from the allegations of plaintiff’s complaint, which is properly limited to the charges investigated by EEOC. But even assuming arguendo the truth of such facts, they cannot be considered “a' continuing unlawful practice” by Fire *141 stone under the Act. Section 2000e-3(a) plainly expresses the purpose and intent of Congress to proscribe discrimination by employers against “employees” or “applicants for employment” on grounds of race or color or because they have “opposed” or exercised lawful procedural rights against such practices. The remedial purposes of the Act will be fully served by adjudication of the issues tendered'by the present complaint, which adequately sets forth the statutory gravamen of the action as embraced in the charges plaintiff filed with EEOC. He will be “entitled to judicial review of all grounds of employment discrimination alleged in his complaint to the EEOC. ...” Green v. McDonnell Douglas Corp., 463 F.2d 337, 342 (8 Cir. 1972). His affidavit assertions of post-employment misconduct by Firestone, if proven, may possibly be relevant to the issue of damages arising from delay in procuring new employment should plaintiff succeed on his statutory claim; they are not additional causes of action under the Act which create venue in this district.

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Bluebook (online)
355 F. Supp. 138, 5 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 782, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/dubnick-v-firestone-tire-rubber-co-of-california-nyed-1973.