Piefer v. Pennsylvania, 2024 U.S. LEXIS 16257 (Pa. Super. July 3, 2024) (Chung, J.)
Samantha Peifer v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Board of Probation and Parole, Pennsylvania Superior Court decided July 3, 2024.
Opinion Of the Court
Chung, Circuit Judge
Samantha Peifer sued her employer, the Pennsylvania Board of Probation and Parole (“Board”), claiming pregnancy discrimination and retaliation under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (“Title VII”) and the Pregnancy Discrimination Act (“PDA”). The District Court granted the Board’s motion for summary judgment.
We will affirm in part and vacate in part. We agree with the District Court that Peifer’s claims partly fail but conclude that the District Court is best situated to analyze in the first instance the impact, if any, of the Supreme Court’s recent holding in Muldrow v. City of St. Louis, 144 S. Ct. 967, 218 L. Ed. 2d 322 (2024), on whether Peifer makes out a prima facie case under an adverse employment action theory based on the Board’s denials of her accommodation requests. We further conclude that Peifer makes out a prima facie case of pregnancy discrimination based on the Board’s denials of her light-duty requests under a failure to accommodate theory. We will thus vacate and remand as to Peifer’s adverse employment theory and failure to accommodate theory for further analysis and affirm the District Court’s decisions on Peifer’s constructive discharge allegation and retaliation claim.
Samantha Peifer worked for the Board as an Alcohol and Other Drugs agent. In that role, she worked with drug and alcohol offenders on parole. Her job required her to be able to perform various physical functions—for instance, running to catch escaping offenders, restraining offenders during arrests, and moving offenders to take them into custody.
In September 2019, Peifer was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. About four months later, in January 2020, she learned that she was pregnant.
However, while this appeal was pending, the Supreme Court held in Muldrow v. City of St. Louis, 144 S. Ct. 967, 218 L. Ed. 2d 322 (2024) that, contrary to our prior precedent, an employee need not demonstrate that the asserted adverse employment action was a “serious and tangible” employment-related harm. Komis v. Sec’y of the United States DOL, 918 F.3d 289, 292 (3d Cir. 2019) (quoting Jones v. Se. Pa. Transp. Auth., 796 F.3d 323, 326 (3d Cir. 2015)). In Muldrow, the Court rejected that the harm must be “serious,” “significant,” “substantial,” or “any similar adjective suggesting that the disadvantage to the employee must exceed a heightened bar.” 144 S. Ct. at 974. Rather, the Court explained that an adverse employment action means simply that the employee suffered “some harm” to a term or condition of employment—in other words, that the employer treated the employee “worse” because of a protected characteristic. Id.
Because Muldrow made clear that adverse employment action need not be serious, we will remand so that the District Court can consider in the first instance whether Peifer has asserted harms sufficient to establish “some” employment-related harm for her prima facie case under Muldrow.
Peifer cannot make out a prima facie case of discrimination based on the Board’s denying her request to work from home. Peifer requested the Board accommodate her in one of two ways: working from home or providing her with PPE. The Board chose the second option. Because the Board provided her the accommodation she requested (though did not prefer), Peifer cannot establish the third element of her prima facie case, and the portion of her claim related to working from home must fail. See id. (employee must show that employer “did not accommodate her”); cf. O’Neal v. City of Chicago, 392 F.3d 909, 913 (7th Cir. 2004) (denial of an employee’s “purely subjective preference” is not an adverse employment action (citation omitted)).
Peifer does make out a prima facie case, however, based on the Board’s denial of her requests for light duty. The District Court decided that Peifer’s claim failed on the third and fourth elements because the Board “did accommodate her,” and “there is no evidence [the Board] treated Ms. Peifer differently than any others with similar limitations.” We disagree with both conclusions as they concern Peifer’s light-duty requests.
Because a reasonable jury could find that she made out a prima facie case, the burden shifts to the Board to show that it denied her light-duty requests for “legitimate, nondiscriminatory” reasons. Id. at 229. If it does, then Peifer must show that its reasons “are in fact pretextual.” Id. Because the District Court decided that Peifer did not make out a prima facie case, it did not analyze whether the Board’s proffered reasons were legitimate and nondiscriminatory or whether Peifer created a genuine dispute that the Board’s non-discriminatory reason was pretextual. We will remand so it can do so.
Peifer does not show a causal connection between any protected activity and an adverse employment action. Peifer argues that she engaged in protected activity when she asked for accommodations and filed EEOC charges and that she suffered adverse employment actions when the Board denied her requests and constructively discharged her. Peifer’s claim fails because she does not show that her protected activity caused the adverse actions she alleges (one of which, constructive discharge, we have already concluded is without merit). There is no evidence that the Board took any actions as retaliation for her EEOC charge; to the contrary, the Board changed its position and granted Peifer light duty soon after she filed her first charge. Similarly, the fact that the Board provided Peifer with an accommodation that she herself requested does not support an inference that it was retaliating against her. Thus, Peifer does not make out a prima facie case of retaliation and we affirm as to this claim.
