Fraelick v. PerkettPR, Inc., et al. (Lawyers Weekly No. 11-071-13)
NOTICE: All slip opinions and orders are subject to formal revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound volumes of the Official Reports. If you find a typographical error or other formal error, please notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Judicial Court, John Adams Courthouse, 1 Pemberton Square, Suite 2500, Boston, MA 02108-1750; (617) 557-1030; SJCReporter@sjc.state.ma.us 11‑P‑1832 Appeals Court HEATHER FRAELICK vs. PERKETTPR, INC., & another.[1] No. 11‑P‑1832. Essex. June 4, 2012. ‑ June 6, 2013. Present: Katzmann, Brown, & Sullivan, JJ. Massachusetts Wage Act. Labor, Wages. Employment, Retaliation. Contract, Employment, Misrepresentation, Interference with contractual relations. Unlawful Interference. Declaratory Relief. Practice, Civil, Dismissal. Civil action commenced in the Superior Court Department on April 13, 2011. A motion to dismiss was heard by Robert A. Cornetta, J. Joseph L. Sulman for the plaintiff. William J. Royal, Jr., for the defendants. BROWN, J. Just days after an at-will employee reiterated her displeasure to her employer at having long been denied a part of her compensation, she was fired. A complaint, filed by the aggrieved employee (plaintiff), set out a series of interlinked facts, sufficiently detailed, which, when read together, suggested the corporate employer and its president had violated § 148A of the Massachusetts Wage Act, G. L. c. 149, §§ 148 et seq. (Wage Act), by terminating the plaintiff’s employment in retaliation for her speaking out to senior management about the employer’s failure to pay timely the sums due under her employment contract. In addition to the Wage Act claim, the plaintiff also sought compensatory relief, on common-law liability theories, and declaratory relief (see G. L. c. 231A), from a written noncompete agreement that she had signed, at the behest of the employer, as a condition of employment. Contesting the legal viability of the complaint, the defendants jointly filed a Mass.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6), 365 Mass. 754 (1974), motion. A judge of the Superior Court allowed the motion and dismissed the complaint in its entirety. On appeal from the dismissal of her complaint by the judge, the plaintiff argues that her complaint alleges plausible entitlements to relief against PerkettPR, Inc. (PPR), and Christine Perkett, PPR’s president (collectively, the defendants). We conclude, for the reasons set forth herein, that the motion to dismiss was improvidently allowed. A rule 12(b)(6) motion may be allowed only when the complaint’s factual allegations (and reasonable inferences therefrom), accepted as true, do not plausibly suggest an entitlement to relief. See Iannacchino v. Ford Motor Co., 451 Mass. 623, 635-636 (2008); Curtis v. Herb Chambers I-95, Inc., 458 Mass. 674, 676 (2011). “Factual allegations must be enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative level . . . […]