Cindy Naraine v. City of Hollywood

[DO NOT PUBLISH]
In the
United States Court of Appeals
For the Eleventh Circuit
____________________
No. 22-13171
Non-Argument Calendar
____________________
CINDY NARAINE,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
versus
CITY OF HOLLYWOOD,
Defendant-Appellee.
____________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Florida
D.C. Docket No. 0:21-cv-60313-RAR
____________________
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2 Opinion of the Court 22-13171
Before WILLIAM PRYOR , Chief Judge, and L AGOA and B RASHER , Cir-
cuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Cindy Naraine appeals the summary judgment in favor of
her former employer, the City of Hollywood, and against her com-
plaint of employment discrimination and retaliation based on race
and sex in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42
U.S.C. § 2000e et seq.; the Florida Civil Rights Act, Fla. Sta. § 760.10;
and 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The district court ruled that Naraine failed to
establish that the city’s proffered legitimate, nondiscriminatory,
and nonretaliatory reasons for terminating her were a pretext for
discrimination. We affirm.
On January 27, 2019, after working for three years as an ad-
ministrative assistant with the information technology depart-
ment, Naraine began a one-year probationary term as a firefighter.
In a recruit class of six, she was the only black female firefighter, as
well as the oldest. She was assigned to the Fire Prevention Bureau,
and the other members—four white males and one Hispanic fe-
male—were assigned to operations. During her first few months,
Naraine received an “excellent” rating on her performance re-
views, and her supervisor, Fire Marshal Chris Del Campo, rated
her performance as “outstanding.”
On November 7, 2019, Naraine was on duty when she asked
a field training officer if she could take a work break. On that break,
she and her domestic partner, Nicholas Gasbarro, a city employee
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22-13171 Opinion of the Court 3
in a different department, met with the city manager, who was Na-
raine’s personal acquaintance. According to Naraine, the purpose
of the meeting was for Gasbarro to request a work schedule change
to allow him more flexibility to care for their children. Naraine
later attested that she could not request a different work schedule
as a first responder, so she attended the meeting only as Gasbarro’s
supporter and “sat quietly.” After the meeting, Gasbarro emailed
the city manager thanking him for “giving us the opportunity to
discuss the hardship” that they were facing as a family. The city
manager later attested that he “recall[ed] both [Naraine] and [Gas-
barro] asking to meet with” him, and his impression was that both
of them “were asking for help during the meeting.” The city man-
ager also attested that, after the meeting, he asked the deputy city
manager to follow up with Fire Chief Rudolfo Jurado to “see if
there’s anything that could be done” for Naraine.
When Chief Jurado learned that Naraine might have met
with the city manager without prior approval, it “caused [him]
great concern.” He explained that the meeting would be an “un-
precedented violation of the chain of command, a probationary
[f]irefighter skipping all intervening levels of supervisory personnel
to meet with the Chief Administrative Officer of the entire City.”
Chief Jurado asked Deputy Chief Analdy Garcia to investigate.
During his investigation, Deputy Chief Garcia and the Dep-
uty Fire Marshal met with Naraine and her supervisor. Deputy
Chief Garcia’s notes from the meeting reflected that Naraine de-
nied contacting the city manager and clarified that Gasbarro had
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4 Opinion of the Court 22-13171
arranged the meeting. Naraine later asserted that she never denied
attending the meeting and that she did not tell Deputy Chief Garcia
whether she attended the meeting because he never asked.
On January 8, 2020, Deputy Chief Garcia recommended ter-
minating Naraine before the end of her probationary year because
she had breached the chain of command and falsely denied having
“any contact” with the city manager. Chief Jurado met with the
city manager and four other city officials about his decision to ter-
minate Naraine based on Garcia’s recommendation. In discussing
the chain-of-command issues, Chief Jurado also mentioned prob-
lems relating to Naraine’s continued inquiries about some fringe
benefits that did not transfer to her new position and her refusal to
accept the department’s decision about the benefits, which had be-
come “burdensome” to him.
A week later, Chief Jurado and Del Campo told Naraine that
“it did not serve the city’s best interest to continue her employ-
ment” and that Chief Jurado determined that she was “not a good
fit for the agency.” Naraine resigned in lieu of termination. The
next month, she reapplied for the same position. She filed a charge
of discrimination two months later. The city deemed Naraine inel-
igible for rehire and interviewed other candidates before hiring a
white male.
Naraine filed a complaint against the city in the district
court. The city moved for summary judgment, which the district
court granted. Because the city conceded for the purposes of sum-
mary judgment that Naraine had established a prima facie case of
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22-13171 Opinion of the Court 5
discrimination, the district court considered the city’s proffered
reasons for its actions and determined that the two reasons were
legitimate, nondiscriminatory, and nonretaliatory.
The district court also ruled that Naraine failed to establish
that the proffered reasons were a pretext for discrimination. It de-
termined that the record established that Naraine violated the
chain of command by meeting with the city manager to discuss
childcare accommodations without her supervisor’s permission
and that Chief Jurado’s belief that she lied during the investigation
was honest, even if mistaken. The district court also ruled that Na-
raine failed to identify a suitable comparator who engaged in simi-
lar misconduct and was treated more favorably.
We review a summary judgment de novo and view the evi-
dence in Naraine’s favor. Tonkyro v. Sec’y, Dep’t of Veterans Affs., 995
F.3d 828, 832 (11th Cir. 2021). Summary judgment is appropriate
when “there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the
movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Fed. R. Civ. P.
56(a). The “summary judgment rule applies in job discrimination
cases just as in other cases. No thumb is to be placed on either side
of the scale.” Chapman v. Al Transport, 229 F.3d 1012, 1026 (11th Cir.
2000) (en banc).
The district court correctly ruled that Naraine failed to es-
tablish that the proffered legitimate, nondiscriminatory reasons for
deciding to terminate her were a pretext for discrimination. Na-
raine argues that she did not violate any workplace policies because
she did not initiate or “participate” in the meeting with the city
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6 Opinion of the Court 22-13171
manager, and she did not falsely deny attending the meeting during
Deputy Chief Garcia’s investigation. But our scope of review is lim-
ited. See Elrod v. Sears, Roebuck & Co., 939 F.2d 1466, 1470 (11th Cir.
1991) (“[We] do not sit as a super-personnel department that reex-
amines an entity’s business decisions.” (quotation marks omitted)).
We ask only whether Chief Jurado, in deciding to terminate Na-
raine, honestly believed that she had violated the department’s pol-
icies. See id. (explaining that our inquiry turns not on whether the
employee was guilty of the alleged misconduct but whether the
decisionmaker believed so in good faith and whether this belief was
the reason for termination); Owens v. Governor’s Off. of Student
Achievement, 52 F.4th 1327, 1338 (11th Cir. 2022) (“An employer
may fire an employee for a good reason, a bad reason, a reason
based on erroneous facts, or for no reason at all, as long as its action
is not for a discriminatory reason.” (quotation marks omitted, em-
phasis added)).
Naraine argues that Chief Jurado did not honestly believe
that she had violated the chain of command. She contends that
Deputy Chief Garcia attested that Chief Jurado told him that she
had requested an accommodation from the city manager, which
she contends is false and is evidence that Chief Jurado was the
source of the “false representation.” This argument fails.
If Chief Jurado expressed to Deputy Chief Garcia before the
investigation that he believed Naraine had met with the city man-
ager about an accommodation request—whether on behalf of her-
self, Gasbarro, or both—that statement would support the city’s
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22-13171 Opinion of the Court 7
position that Chief Jurado honestly believed that Naraine had vio-
lated the chain of command. The evidence is undisputed that Chief
Jurado consulted with the city manager about his decision to ter-
minate Naraine. The city manager’s recollection was that both Na-
raine and Gasbarro requested the meeting and “were asking for
help.” Naraine failed to present any evidence that Chief Jurado did
not honestly believe she had violated workplace policies. Because
the undisputed evidence also establishes that Chief Jurado decided
to terminate Naraine based on his belief that she was uncoopera-
tive during the investigation, we need not address her argument
that the district court should have disregarded Deputy Chief Gar-
cia’s deposition, which contained a purported transcription error
regarding his, but not Chief Jurado’s, impression of Naraine’s truth-
fulness during the investigation.
We AFFIRM the summary judgment in favor of the city.
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