Jury Instructions

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: Richard Brooks v. City of Kankakee, Illinois,

Case No.: 20-1395

Officials: EASTERBROOK, RIPPLE, and ROVNER, Circuit Judges.

Focus: Jury Instructions

Richard Brooks, an African American police officer, made statements on multiple occasions complaining that his employer, the City of Kankakee, Illinois, favored white officers. The City, viewing the statements as false and disparaging, issued a written reprimand letter to Mr. Brooks ordering him to stop making such statements and warning him that he faced discipline up to and including termination should he engage in further public disparagement.

Mr. Brooks filed a complaint in the district court against the City alleging that it had retaliated against him, in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, by failing to promote him and by issuing to him a reprimand letter after he had engaged in protected activity. The City filed a motion for summary judgment. In response, Mr. Brooks attempted to introduce a new claim alleging that the City’s promotional policies had a disparate impact on minority officers. The district court dismissed Mr. Brooks’s disparate impact claim and granted summary judgment to the City on his retaliation by failure to promote claim. The court, however, denied summary judgment on Mr. Brooks’s retaliation-by-reprimand claim, concluding that a genuine issue of material fact remained as to whether Mr. Brooks’s statements constituted protected activity.

Mr. Brooks’s retaliation-by-reprimand claim proceeded to trial, and a jury returned a verdict for the City. The court denied Mr. Brooks’s motions for judgment as a matter of law. Mr. Brooks now appeals, contending that no reasonable jury could have found for the City and that his disparate impact claim was improperly dismissed. In the alternative, he argues that the district court misstated the law in its jury instructions and requests that we remand for a new trial. We now affirm the district court’s judgment.

Derek A Hawkins is Corporate Counsel, at Salesforce.