Wray v. McKesson Speciality Arizona

• Court: District Court, D. Arizona
• Decided: March 4, 2022
• Docket: 2:20-cv-02381
• Status: Unknown

Opinion

1 WO 2 3 4 5 6 IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 7 FOR THE DISTRICT OF ARIZONA

9 Gary N Wray, No. CV-20-02381-PHX-DLR

10 Plaintiff, ORDER

11 v.

12 McKesson Specialty Arizona, et al.,

13 Defendants. 14 15 16 Pending before the Court is Defendant McKesson Specialty Arizona’s1 motion for 17 judgment on the pleadings, which is fully briefed. (Docs. 30, 37, 38.) The Court grants 18 the motion. 19 Plaintiff Gary Wray, an African-American male, is a former employee of Defendant 20 and was terminated on July 26, 2019. (Doc. 17 at 4.) He filed a charge of discrimination 21 with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on May 19, 2020, alleging that 22 Defendant discriminated against him as early as July 22, 2019 and as recently as July 26, 23 2019. He received his Notice of Right to Sue letter in August 2019 and then filed a 24 complaint against Defendant. (Doc. 1 at 2.) The operative complaint alleges that 25 Defendant committed discriminatory acts against Plaintiff in the following months: 2017 26 (December), 2018 (February, July, August, December), and 2019 (January, May, July). 27 Plaintiff filed on May 19, 2019. (Doc. 14 at 4.) Defendant filed a motion for judgment on

28 1 McKesson Specialty Arizona no longer exists as a legal entity due to its merger into RxC. (Doc. 30 at 1.) 1 the pleadings, asking the court to limit the scope of Mr. Wray’s Title VII claims to events 2 occurring on or after July 24, 2019, arguing that any prior events are time barred. (Doc. 3 30 at 3.) 4 A motion for judgment on the pleadings under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(c) 5 “is properly granted when, taking all the allegations in the non-moving party’s pleadings 6 as true, the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Fajardo v. Cty. of 7 L.A., 179 F.3d 698, 699 (9th Cir. 1999). “Rule 12(c) is ‘functionally identical’ to Rule 8 12(b)(6) and . . . ‘the same standard of review’ applies to motions brought under either 9 rule.” Cafasso v. Gen. Dynamics C4 Sys., 637 F.3d 1047, 1054 n.4 (9th Cir. 2011) (quoting 10 Dworkin v. Hustler Magazine Inc., 867 F.2d 1188, 1192 (9th Cir. 1989)). Thus, a motion 11 for judgment on the pleadings will be granted if the complaint lacks “sufficient factual 12 matter, accepted as true, to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Ashcroft v. 13 Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). If 14 appropriate, a court may grant partial judgment on the pleadings. Cafasso, 637 F.3d at 154 15 n.4. 16 A charge of discrimination filed with the EEOC must be brought within 300 days 17 of the allegedly unlawful employment act. 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-5(e)(1); Scott v. Gino 18 Morena Enterprises, LLC, 888 F.3d 1101, 1112 (9th Cir. 2018). Claims not filed with the 19 EEOC within 300 days are time-barred. See Mulvihill v. Pac. Mar. Ass’n, 587 Fed.Appx. 20 422, 423 (9th Cir. 2014). 21 Because Mr. Wray filed a charge with the EEOC on May 19, 2020, any alleged 22 discriminatory act occurring before July 24, 2019 is time barred. That his termination 23 occurred within the statutory period does not make any of the events outside of that period 24 timely. See Delaware State College v. Rick, 449 U.S. 250, 257 (1980) (“Mere continuity 25 of employment, without more, is insufficient to prolong the life of a cause of action for 26 employment discrimination.”). In his Response, Mr. Wray attached several emails 27 documenting internal complaints he made to Defendant before July 24, 2019, implicitly 28 arguing that such complaints permit him to sue Defendant for acts taken before July 24, || 2019. Not so. Internal complaints do not satisfy the statutory requirement to bring a charge with the EEOC within 300 days of the allegedly discriminatory act. Mr. Wray may not 3 || rely on events that occurred before July 24, 2019 to prosecute his Title VII claim. 4 IT IS ORDERED that Defendant’s Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings (Doc. 5|| 30) is GRANTED as described in this order. 6 IT IS FURTHER ORDERED directing the Clerk of the Court to substitute RxC as the proper Defendant. 8 Dated this 3rd day of March, 2022. 9 10 ll {Z, 12 _- Ae 13 Upited States Dictic Judge 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

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