Defendants in the long-running Goldman Sachs gender bias suit are asking the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit to clarify conflicting rulings in the Southern District, which would effectively nullify the plaintiffs' claims.
In a brief filed Monday by Sullivan & Cromwell partner Robert Giuffra Jr. seeking a "paradigmatic" interlocutory appeal by the circuit, the defendants asked the court to clarify two issues raised before Southern District Judge Analisa Torres in Chen-Oster v. Goldman, Sachs,10-cv-06950.
In that case, several female employees are seeking class status against the global financial firm for alleged gender bias among the higher employee ranks. At issue is the most recent attempts by two defendants to seek injunctive and declaratory relief from the firm, despite no longer being employed there.
Torres granted Goldman leave to pursue interlocutory appeal to get clarity on two issues dealing with federal employment law. The first is whether an employee seeking reinstatement under Title VII has standing, and, second, whether an employee can seek reinstatement at all if no wrongful termination has been alleged.
Goldman argues that the questions of first impression before the court should rely on the U.S. Supreme Court's 2011 decision in Wal-Mart Stores v. Dukes, which the firm argues is unambiguous in denying former employees standing in employment discrimination suits against former employers.
The defendants say the original judge handling the case, former Southern District Judge Leonard Sand, got it right in 2012 when he found Wal-Mart held as such. Southern District Magistrate Judge James Francis IV agreed when he oversaw the case, despite initially finding otherwise.
Torres, however, reversed the decision nearly four years later in denying a motion to dismiss claims by two new plaintiffs. She found that former employee standing was not part of what the Supreme Court reviewed, according to Goldman. In doing so, Torres opened the case back up to the full scope of plaintiffs' demands.
The ruling is "directly contrary" to Wal-Mart, as well as decisions in the Ninth and Eleventh Circuits, defendants argue. Likewise, they argued, five separate circuits have found voluntary separation from a company not to be cause for reinstatement.
However, the defendants noted that "three different judges reached different conclusions on the same legal question" of standing in the suit alone, while "[o]ther district courts within this circuit have similarly divided on this legal question." The defense also asserted that they failed to find any other decision asserting the right of reinstatement without allegations of unlawful discharge.