LAUSD teacher requests accommodations for anxiety disorder brought on by district's failure to protect the teacher and maintain a safe school environment. $915K. Los Angeles County.

Facts and Background

• Facts and Background:

  On December 18, 2019, plaintiff a Holmes Middle School teacher, discovered what he considered to be violent, hate-filled caricatures targeting him, created by four eighth-grade boys. These frightening images featured bloody bullet holes, a hatchet in his head, Nazi symbols, references to the MS-13 gang, racist and anti-Semitic slurs. 

  Plaintiff immediately brought the drawings to the attention of Holmes’s school administration. Despite raising urgent safety concerns for himself and his students, and repeated requests for a safety plan, he was ignored, and the school attempted to return the boys to his class the following day.  The assistant principal, Mari Ann Aguilar testified the pictures were “unflattering caricatures” and were “subject to interpretation” as to whether they were violent in nature.  Similarly, the principal, Hahn Kim D’Alosio, dismissed the significance of the drawings.

  Plaintiff, believing a hate crime occurred, filed a police report with LAPD, but was told the incident fell under the jurisdiction of the LAUSD police. 

  During the school’s winter holiday break, plaintiff became increasingly agitated, unsettled, and he could not sleep. He sought the assistance of a therapist, who took him off work from January 13, 2020 to January 24, 2020, returning to work on January 27, 2020. He was nervous, uncertain, and scared. His supervisor showed up for an unannounced “observation” on his first day back, followed by another two days later. When he received a notice of a “possible disciplinary” meeting, he experienced a panic attack as he believed the school was retaliating against him for his complaints and taking medical leave. Plaintiff visited the emergency room due to this attack. Plaintiff developed a mental disability of adjustment disorder with anxiety. His therapist took him off work again on FMLA/CFRA leave from January 30, 2020 to April 29, 2020. 

  On February 19, 2020, plaintiff was advised, for the first time, that he might receive a below-standard performance evaluation.  He requested, and LAUSD agreed, that he should receive a supplemental formal observation under the CBA. This was never done. Plaintiff wanted to return to work and requested reasonable accommodations for his mental disability in writing in a February 25, 2020 e-mail. Despite admissions by principal D’Alosio and assistant principal, Thelma Ponce, that they recognized plaintiff was asking for accommodation and that an interactive process meeting should have been conducted, there was no such meeting. Because of the actions/inactions of LAUSD, his CFRA/FMLA leave was extended to July 29, 2020.

  While plaintiff was on medical leave, Ponce and D’Alosio conducted a meeting without plaintiff and issued a below-standards evaluation and his teaching contract was not renewed. He was denied his right to a supplemental formal observation. 

• Plaintiff's Contentions:

  That LAUSD discriminated against plaintiff because of his disability, his extended FMLA/CFRA leave, and because of his complaints of workplace safety.  LAUSD failed to engage in the FEHA-mandated interactive process and failed to reasonably accommodate his disability. Plaintiff was retaliated against under FEHA, CFRA, and Labor Code § 1102.5.  In March 2020, LAUSD went to remote teaching because of the Covid-19 pandemic, and that plaintiff could have returned to work and taught remotely. 

• Defendant's Contentions:

  That plaintiff was a poor performer, and his non-renewal of the contract was justified. It also claimed that the Education Code and the CBA required it to conduct the final performance evaluation without plaintiff, and since he was on medical leave he forfeited his opportunity to have a supplemental performance observation. Plaintiff was a contract employee, and LAUSD could elect not to renew the contract for no reason. LAUSD also contended that they did not know of plaintiff’s disability.