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PENNSYLVANIA RECORD

Thursday, March 28, 2024

Third Circuit: Doctor's second appeal in ethnic discrimination and termination suit not supported by case law

Federal Court
Tms

Temple University Hospital

PHILADELPHIA – A U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit panel rejected a Texas doctor’s second appeal for lack of substantiation, in a case in which he sued Temple University Hospital and a number of doctors for discrimination and wrongful termination.

On March 5, Third Circuit judges Cheryl Ann Krause, Paul B. Matey and Robert E. Cowen affirmed a U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania ruling made against plaintiff Dr. Rao Mandalapu, a Houston resident.

In November 2015, Mandalapu filed an employment discrimination suit against Temple University Hospital and several of its doctors, Jack H. Mydlo, Robert Guy Uzzo, Richard E. Greenburg, David Y.T. Chen, Alexander Kutikov, Robert S. Charles, Steven J. Hirshberg and Yan F. Shibutani.

The suit alleged that Mandalapu, of Indian background, had faced discrimination based on his race, ancestry, ethnic and linguistic characteristics, and later, wrongful termination. At the conclusion of the case, the District Court granted summary judgment to the defendants, and on appeal, the Third Circuit affirmed that decision.

“During the pendency of the summary judgment appeal litigated by his attorneys, Dr. Mandalapu filed in the District Court multiple motions for relief from judgment. Pertinent to the current appeal, he filed an omnibus motion under Rules 60(b), 60(d), and 62.1 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure,” the Third Circuit stated.

“The motion was accompanied by hundreds of pages of exhibits: It asserted that new evidence had been discovered, that defendants had stonewalled during discovery and submitted misleading evidence in support of their motion for summary judgment and contended that the District Court had failed to properly assess all of the evidence in the record.”

The District Court denied the motion, pursuant to Rule 62.1(a)(2). That rule of federal civil procedure allows a court to deny a motion if it seeks relief that the court lacks authority to grant because of an appeal that has been docketed and is pending.

Dr. Mandalapu appealed to the Third Circuit for a second time, this time on grounds for abuse of discretion.

The Third Circuit opened by saying that Dr. Mandalapu’s opening brief confirmed that his omnibus motion looked for “a wholesale re-litigation of the District Court’s summary judgment ruling that we affirmed last year” – but that such an action would not be a proper use of Rule 60(b) and if Dr. Mandalapu raised any new claims of legal error, they could and should have been raised in the earlier appeal.

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b) allows that on submission of motion and just terms, the court may relieve a party or its legal representative from a final judgment, order, or proceeding for several reasons, including a mistake, newly-discovered evidence that couldn’t have been located in time to move for a new trial, fraud, misrepresentation or any other reason that justifies relief.

“Furthermore, and to the extent that Dr. Mandalapu claimed in his motion that he had new supporting evidence, we agree with the District Court to the contrary. Additionally, there are no exceptional circumstances warranting relief under Rule 60(b)(6),” the Third Circuit said.

“And, finally, there is no evidence – let alone the clear and convincing kind required by either Rule 60(d)(3) or Rule 60(b)(3) of any fraud committed by defendants. For those reasons, we conclude that the District Court did not abuse its discretion in denying relief under Rules 60(b), 60(d), and 62.1. Accordingly, we will affirm.”

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit case 19-2854

U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania case 2:15-cv-05977

From the Pennsylvania Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com

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