Dive Brief:
- A former security guard for Weiser Security Services failed to show that under a “cat’s paw” theory of liability, his supervisor manipulated a manager into firing him because he told HR the supervisor allegedly gave female employees preferential treatment, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held Tuesday in Dominguez v. Weiser Security Services, Inc.
- The security guard worked at a Halliburton facility in Oklahoma under a contract Weiser had with Halliburton, according to court documents. During an HR investigation into another employee’s race discrimination claim against the supervisor, the security guard allegedly told Weiser’s vice president of human relations that he believed the supervisor favored female employees.
- A few days later, a Weiser manager fired the security guard. According to court records, the manager said he believed the guard failed to follow COVID protocols and didn’t adequately train his officers on COVID procedures. The security guard sued Weiser for retaliation in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Finding no evidence the supervisor or the manager knew he reported the supervisor for alleged sex discrimination, the 10th Circuit upheld summary judgment for Weiser.
Dive Insight:
Attorneys for the security guard did not respond to a request for comment.
Under the cat’s paw theory, an employer is liable for retaliation “when an employee who harbors discriminatory animus knows about protected activity and uses a decisionmaker to accomplish his ‘own biased designs,’” the 10th Circuit explained.
Here, the parties didn’t dispute the security guard engaged in protected activity when he complained to the HR VP about the supervisor’s alleged sex discrimination, the court pointed out. The parties also didn’t dispute that the manager was the decision-maker in his termination, the panel said.
Instead, the security guard’s cat’s paw argument failed because he couldn’t show the supervisor knew about his complaint to the HR VP, the 10th Circuit held.
As evidence of the supervisor’s knowledge, the security guard asserted that when he didn’t attend a COVID training session on his day off — a few days after he spoke to the HR VP — the supervisor falsely told the manager he had been instructed to attend the session.
The 10th Circuit agreed the supervisor’s false statement indicated a bad motive, but without more evidence, one could only speculate as to what exactly that motive was, the court said.
For instance, the motive could have been something “benign,” like the supervisor merely disliking the security guard, the panel noted. Or, given that COVID training was a serious issue for Weiser and Halliburton, the supervisor could have been trying to shift the blame for any training shortfalls, the 10th Circuit added.
Occasionally invoked during discrimination and retaliation cases, the cat’s paw theory can be difficult to prove in court.
In 2024, for example, the 6th Circuit ruled against a Michigan paralegal who claimed the lawyer she was assigned to work with influenced the office administrator’s decision to fire her because the lawyer was biased against her because of her age.
While the lawyer’s actions — bringing adult diapers and a wheelchair to her 50th birthday party — were evidence of age bias, the paralegal’s claim failed because she failed to show the lawyer intended to cause her adverse action, the 6th Circuit held.