Valentino has beaten a case accusing it of discriminating and retaliating against a former employee on the basis of race by not promoting her to a supervisor position and issuing her a “formal warning” following her alleged failure to abide by company policy. In an order on Wednesday, Judge Eleanor Ross of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia adopted a magistrate judge’s final report and recommendation, granting summary judgment in favor of the Italian fashion brand and one of its store managers and dismissing Plaintiff Dana Turner’s case in its entirety.
Siding with Valentino, Judge Ross relied on the final report and recommendation issued earlier this month by Magistrate Judge Catherine Salinas, who found that Turner falls short in pleading her discrimination and retaliation causes of action. First addressing Turner’s discrimination claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1981, Judge Salinas held that Turner – who was employed as a sales associate at a Valentino store in Atlanta – “failed to create a material issue of fact as to whether she was qualified [for the selling supervisor position],” which she claims she was not offered because she is African American.
“In the absence of evidence showing that Turner was qualified for the selling supervisor position,” such as by having “at least three years of supervisor or senior sales experience,” Salinas determined that Turner “failed to create a prima facie case of discrimination.” Judge Salinas held that had Turner created a prima facia case, the burden would have shifted to Valentino to articulate a “legitimate, non-discriminatory reason for not promoting Turner to the selling supervisor position.” Valentino would have succeeded here, as well, according to the Magistrate Judge, as it argued that it selected another woman – Katerliya Hall, who is not African American – for the selling supervisor position because her “credentials were objectively superior to those of Turner.” Such a reason would have satisfied the “exceedingly light burden” on Valentino to articulate “a legitimate, non-discriminatory reason,” according to the Magistrate Judge.
Against that background and given that Turner “failed to present evidence sufficient to create a fact dispute as to whether Valentino’s stated reason was actually a pretext for discrimination,” Judge Salinas determined that summary judgment was warranted (for Valentino) on Turner’s discrimination claim.
Turning her attention to Turner’s retaliation claim under Section 1981, which “prohibits an employer from retaliating against its employee in response to the employee’s complaint of race-based discrimination,” the Magistrate Judge again sided with Valentino. To establish a prima facie case of retaliation, a plaintiff must show that: (1) she engaged in statutorily protected activity; (2) she suffered an adverse employment action; and (3) there was some causal relation between the two events. Valentino argued – and the Magistrate Judge agreed – that “among other things, Turner fails to establish the second element of her prima facie case – that she suffered a materially adverse employment action when she received the written warning” in connection with an in-store incident.
On the heels of lodging a discrimination complaint with Valentino HR, which Valentino investigated and ultimately, concluded that “no evidence supported Turner’s race discrimination allegations,” Turner claims that she was retaliated against – in response to a separate issue – by way of a written warning. According to the court’s recommendation, Turner received a written warning after assisting a new customer – and entering his credit card details manually without prior management approval, which runs afoul of Valentino store policy – in transactions that were “later determined to be fraudulent.”
While Turner argued that the written warning amounted to an adverse action, the Magistrate Judge was not convinced, stating that Valentino “provided undisputed evidence that the written warning did not affect Turner’s pay or job duties and that Turner later received a pay raise.” In lieu of “some evidence that the written warning negatively affected Turner in some material way, the written warning does not qualify as an adverse employment action,” the Magistrate Judge stated, noting that she “failed to dispute that she violated company policy in connection with the incident or show that the written warning was not appropriate.”
Valentino also argued that even if the written warning qualified as a materially adverse action, Turner “cannot satisfy the third element of her prima facie case because she has failed to present evidence of a causal connection between her protected activity and the written warning.”
With the foregoing in mind, the Magistrate Judge recommended that Valentino’s motion for summary judgment be granted. Having found “no error” in the Magistrate Judge’s final report and recommendation, Judge Ross adopted the findings as the opinion of the court, ordering that judgment be entered in favor of Valentino and that the case be closed.
The case is Turner v. Valentino USA, Inc., et al., 1:21-CV-01739 (N.D. Ga.)
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