Zoller v. GCA Advisors Lays Out Rules For Determining Whether Statutory Claims Can Be Arbitrated.
Zoller v. GCA Advisors, No. 20-15595 (9th Cir. 4/14/21) (Wallace, Smith, Restani), reverses the district court's denial of defendants' motion to compel arbitration of statutory employment discrimination and civil rights claims.
Shannon Zoller, a corporate attorney turned investment banker, sued her former employer for contract claims, gender discrimination, denial of equal pay, and conspiracy to violate her civil rights. An agreement to arbitrate existed. The parties agreed to arbitrate some of the claims, but she refused to arbitrate her statutory claims. The district court agreed on the ground she did not knowingly waiver her right to pursue the statutory claims in court.
Judge Wallace, writing for the court, explains that if the parties agree to arbitrate, statutory claims will be arbitrated, unless a party can prove a congressional intent to prelude a waiver of judicial remedies. This put a burden of proof on Zoller and she could not carry that burden.
There is a proviso. Arbitration of Title VII claims for employment discrimination requires at least showing a knowing agreement to arbitrate employment disputes. Here, that was demonstrated by a number of documents that referred to employment and arbitration. Assuming, without deciding, that the "knowing waiver requirement remains good law", the appeal "is resolved on the arbitration agreement's clear language encompassing employment disputes and evidence that Zoller knowingly waived her right to a judicial forum to resolve her statutory claims."
COMMENTS: This is an impactful case, since it makes it clear that statutory claims, including civil rights and employment claims, may be subject to arbitration, and that a carefully drafted agreement will result in a knowing waiver of the employee's right to a judicial forum. In his 2017 book, Closing the Courthouse Door: How Your Constitutional Rights Became Unenforceable, Erwin Chemerinsky discussed how arbitration has made it more difficult to get into court to vindicate rights. Zoller is an example of that trend. All her claims will now be sent to arbitration -- though it does not automatically follow that her rights will be unenforceable.
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