Ross v. Oceans Behavioral Hospital of Greater New Orleans

165 So. 3d 176, 39 I.E.R. Cas. (BNA) 746, 14 La.App. 5 Cir. 368, 2014 La. App. LEXIS 2839, 2014 WL 6687260
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedNovember 25, 2014
DocketNo. 14-CA-368
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 165 So. 3d 176 (Ross v. Oceans Behavioral Hospital of Greater New Orleans) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ross v. Oceans Behavioral Hospital of Greater New Orleans, 165 So. 3d 176, 39 I.E.R. Cas. (BNA) 746, 14 La.App. 5 Cir. 368, 2014 La. App. LEXIS 2839, 2014 WL 6687260 (La. Ct. App. 2014).

Opinion

STEPHEN J. WINDHORST, Judge.

12Plaintiff, Eugenia Ross, appeals from the dismissal of her suit pursuant to a motion for summary judgment filed by defendant, Oceans Behavioral Hospital of Greater New Orleans (“the Hospital”). We affirm the decision of the trial court.

Ms. Ross, a registered nurse, was employed by the Hospital. On December 27, 2008, she reported an alleged assault committed by a mental health technician on a patient to the hospital administrator. She alleges that the administrator took no action, so she reported the assault to corporate compliance. She was terminated three days later, Ms. Ross then filed suit against the Hospital for lost wages and other damages under La. R.S. 23:967, claiming she was terminated in retaliation for reporting the assault.

Ms. Ross’s allegations arose out of a conversation she had with a fellow employee, Dorothy Ellis. According to Ms. Ross, Ellis told her that another employee, Rose Brumfield, had pushed a patient to the ground because the patient was trying to hit Brumfield with his walker. Ellis, however, did not see the alleged battery. Ms. Ross reported the incident to the hospital administrator, but did not Lsign the form because she too did not see the event. She also did not discuss the incident with Brumfield. Ms. Ross stated that because the hospital administrator took no action, she reported the incident to corporate compliance, who conducted an investigation. During the investigation, both the patient and Brumfield denied that the event occurred. Finding nothing to support the allegation, the hospital deemed the matter concluded.

According to the Hospital, Ms. Ross was terminated for matters unrelated to this incident.

The Hospital’s motion for summary judgment alleged that there were no material issues of fact and that Ms. Ross would be unable to meet her burden of proving that any violation of state law occurred, or that the alleged violation constituted a “workplace act or practice.” Therefore, it argues, the plaintiff would be unable present evidence to support the elements of La. R.S. 23:967.

Along with her opposition to the motion, Ms. Ross provided exhibits consisting of:

Exhibit 1: Ms. Ross’s affidavit;
Exhibit 2: an unsworn and unsigned statement by Ellis which referred to statements allegedly made by Brum-field;
Exhibit 3: an incident report authored by Ellis;
Exhibit 4: handwritten notes which contained the results of the Hospital’s investigation into the alleged incident, which were written by an unknown writer and were not authenticated and which contained third party statements; and Exhibit 5: an affidavit by employee La-Tonya McGee which described a conversation that she overheard.

The Hospital filed a motion to strike the exhibits attached to Ms. Ross’s opposition.

After a hearing, the trial court granted the Hospital’s motion to strike and ordered that the affidavit of Ross (Ex. 1), the un-sworn statement of Ellis (Ex. 2), 14and Ms. McGee’s affidavit (Ex. 5) be stricken. In its reasons for judgment, the court said:

Exhibit 1, Plaintiffs Affidavit, is merely 'a restatement of what Dorothy Ellis told Plaintiff about the incident. The affidavit does not contain any person knowledge of whether the alleged assault actually occurred, and contains inadmissible hearsay.
Exhibit 2, the handwritten statement of Dorothy Ellis, is not in the form of an [179]*179affidavit. Moreover, the statement contains inadmissible hearsay concerning the alleged assault.
Exhibit 5, the affidavit of Lotoya [szc ] McGee, does not contain any personal knowledge of whether the alleged 'assault actually occurred, and contains inadmissible hearsay.

The court also granted the Hospital’s motion for summary judgment. The court found that plaintiff failed to present any admissible evidence to support her claim. After noting that exhibits 1, 2 and 5 had been stricken from the record, the court further found that exhibits 3 and 4 could not be considered because:

Exhibit 3, the Incident/Accident Report, is not authenticated and contains inadmissible hearsay concerning the incident. Exhibit 4, the handwritten notes allegedly taken during Defendant’s investigation of the incident, was prepared by an unknown source. It is not in the form of an affidavit; it is not authenticated, and it contains inadmissible hearsay.

In this appeal, Ms. Ross assigns as error the trial court’s ruling granting summary judgment and also granting the motion to strike.

In challenging the trial court’s ruling granting the motion to strike, Ms. Ross contends that the exhibits stricken fell under exceptions to the hearsay rule, and therefore would have been admissible in court.

With regard to summary judgment motions, La. C.C.P. art. 967A provides that “Supporting and opposing affidavits shall be made on personal knowledge, shall set forth such facts as would be admissible in ’ evidence, and. shall show affirmatively that the affiant is competent to testify to the matters stated therein. Personal knowledge means something the witness actually saw or heard, as | ¡^distinguished from what he learned from some other person or source.” Midland Funding, LLC v. Trahan, 12-562 (La.App. 5 Cir. 2/21/13), 110 So.3d 1154, 1157. (Emphasis added.)

LSA-C.C.P. art, 967 uses the conjunctive in requiring that the evidence offered in support of or in opposition to a motion for summary judgment be not only admissible, but it must also affirmatively show that the affiant is competent to testify to matters stated in the affidavit, and, more significantly, it must be made “on personal knowledge.” Therefore, the fact that evidence may be admissible is not the same as saying that it is made based on personal knowledge and is not sufficient in itself to satisfy the LSA-C.C.P. art. 967 personal knowledge requirement.

Id. at 1157, citing Tritt v. Gares, 98-0704 (La.App. 4 Cir. 12/23/98), 735 So.2d 659, 663.

In this case, it is clear that the stricken exhibits attached to the memo in opposition to summary judgment were not based on the personal knowledge, but instead were unreliable hearsay told to Ms. Ross and others, and were correctly excluded by the trial court. We find no error' in the trial court’s ruling striking exhibits 1, 2 and 5.

In her second assignment of error, Ms. Ross alleges that it was error for the trial court to grant the Hospital’s motion for summary judgment. She contends that had the above exhibits been considered, a material issue of fact would exist as to whether a battery was committed, and whether shfe was terminated as a result of her actions in reporting the alleged battery.

[180]*180Summary judgment shall be rendered “if the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions, together with the affidavits, if any, admitted for purposes of the motion for summary judgment, show that there is no genuine issue as to material fact, and that the mover is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” La. C.C.P. art. 966B(2).

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Bluebook (online)
165 So. 3d 176, 39 I.E.R. Cas. (BNA) 746, 14 La.App. 5 Cir. 368, 2014 La. App. LEXIS 2839, 2014 WL 6687260, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ross-v-oceans-behavioral-hospital-of-greater-new-orleans-lactapp-2014.