Hiller v. County of Suffolk

199 F.R.D. 101, 2001 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2011, 2001 WL 197819
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. New York
DecidedFebruary 20, 2001
DocketNo. CV-95-4496 VVP
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 199 F.R.D. 101 (Hiller v. County of Suffolk) 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
Hiller v. County of Suffolk, 199 F.R.D. 101, 2001 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2011, 2001 WL 197819 (E.D.N.Y. 2001).

Opinion

OPINION AND ORDER

POHORELSKY, United States Magistrate Judge.

Following a jury verdict in favor of the five plaintiffs, the parties have made various post-trial motions. The defendants have moved for judgment as a matter of law under Rule 50(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, and have moved in the alternative for a new trial or for a remittitur under Rule 59 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The plaintiffs have moved for an award of their attorneys fees and other costs. For the reasons below, the defendants’ motion for judgment as a matter of law is GRANTED, their motion for a new trial is conditionally GRANTED on two independent grounds, and the plaintiffs’ motion for attorneys’ fees and costs is GRANTED in part.

BACKGROUND

The plaintiffs brought this civil rights action to challenge the implementation of an affirmative action program by the Suffolk County Police Department. The program, known as the Cadet Program, had been adopted by the county legislature to redress the continuing underrepresentation of minorities on the police force. Notwithstanding the implementation of an aggressive recruitment program mandated by a consent decree entered into between the Department of Jus[103]*103tice and the County in the 1980’s, the number of black and Hispanic police officers remained substantially under the targets that had been set. The then Commissioner of the Police Department, Peter Cosgrove, proposed the program because of his awareness of the shortfall and because the Department had operational needs for minority officers to work as undercover operatives and in other capacities in minority communities.

From its inception, the Cadet Program was open only to a limited number of black and Hispanic candidates, and provided various benefits to those accepted, including free tuition at the Suffolk County Community College, to enable them to compete more effectively for positions on the police force. The Program did not guarantee employment on the police force, as employment still depended on the results of a competitive examination open to all persons. Successful graduates from the Program, however, were to be given a preference such that if they obtained a passing grade on the police examination they would be placed at the top of the list regardless of their scores. In other words, they would move ahead of others who scored higher than they, and would be hired first as positions in the police department became available.

Each of the plaintiffs sought admission to the Cadet Program but were denied because they were white. After filing charges of discrimination with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and receiving right-to-sue letters, they brought the instant action under federal and state laws, including section 1983, Title VII and the state Human Rights Law. Finding that the establishment of the Cadet Program did not pass the strict scrutiny required for governmental classifications that discriminate on the basis of race, Judge Seybert granted summary judgment to the plaintiffs on liability.

Following further proceedings regarding the issue of damages, the parties consented to resolution of the issue by this magistrate judge. In rulings prior to and during the ensuing trial, the court dismissed the claims against the individual defendants on grounds of immunity and limited the trial on damages to issues regarding the emotional distress suffered by the plaintiffs because of the implementation of the Program. At the close of the evidence, before the case was submitted to the jury, the defendants moved for judgment as a matter of law on various grounds including those on which they now rely in making their post-verdict motion. The case was submitted to the jury, which rendered verdicts awarding $50,000 in damages for emotional distress to each of the five plaintiffs.

Following the verdict, the defendants timely renewed their motion for judgment as a matter of law, and moved in the alternative for a new trial and for remittitur. The plaintiffs cross-moved for an award of their attorneys’ fees and expenses.

I.

Motions for judgment as a matter of law under Rule 50 are governed by the same standards as those that govern motions for summary judgment. See, e.g., Piesco v. Koch, 12 F.3d 332, 340 (2d Cir.1993). Thus, under Rule 50(a), “the trial judge must direct a verdict if, under the governing law, there can be but one reasonable conclusion as to the verdict.” Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 250, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986). As on summary judgment, the trial judge must draw all reasonable inferences, and resolve all credibility assessments, in favor of the non-moving party. See United States v. One Parcel of Property Located at 121 Allen Place, 75 F.3d 118, 121 (2d Cir.1996). The court may not itself weigh the credibility of witnesses or consider the weight of the evidence. DiSanto v. McGraw-Hill, Inc., 220 F.3d 61, 64 (2d Cir. 2000). Thus, judgment as a matter of law should not be granted unless (1) there is such a complete absence of evidence supporting the verdict that the jury’s findings could only have been the result of sheer surmise and conjecture, or (2) there is such an overwhelming amount of evidence in favor of the movant that reasonable and fair minded [persons] could not arrive at a verdict against [it]. Id.

The defendants’ principal argument on this motion is that the plaintiffs have not [104]*104established a causal connection between the emotional injuries they suffered and the discriminatory conduct found unlawful by the court here. In assessing that argument, it is essential to specify with precision the unlawful conduct here. The unlawful conduct was the establishment of the Cadet Program itself, not the failure to accept the plaintiffs into the Program or to hire the plaintiffs as police officers. It was conceded that the plaintiffs were given the opportunity to take the competitive police examination, and that their scores placed them well down the list. Thus, even if the Cadet Program had never been instituted, the Police Department would never have offered any of the plaintiffs the opportunity to be police officers based on their scores on the competitive examination. Put simply, the institution of the Cadet Program, and the fact that the Program gave a preference in hiring to minorities, did not deprive any of the plaintiffs of a job.

The Cadet Program here is not unlike the preference system examined by the Supreme Court in Northeastern Florida Chapter of the Associated General Contractors of America v. City of Jacksonville, 508 U.S. 656, 113 S.Ct. 2297, 124 L.Ed.2d 586 (1993). There, the city of Jacksonville, Florida adopted an affirmative action plan that set aside a certain percentage of the city’s contracts solely for minority-owned businesses.

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Bluebook (online)
199 F.R.D. 101, 2001 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2011, 2001 WL 197819, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/hiller-v-county-of-suffolk-nyed-2001.