Federal Judiciary

Motion to Dismiss for Failure to Exhaust Administrative Remedies Granted

By Michael C. Smith

Russell v. Good Shepherd Medical Center, 2009 WL 2487108(E.D.Tex. Aug 12, 2009) (NO. CIV.A. 2-08-CV-206)

Judge: T. John Ward

Holding: Defendant's Motion to Dismiss GRANTED

This is an employment case against a local hospital alleging sex and gender discrimination as a result of its alleged failure to allow a kitchen worker to interview for a security position. The hospital moved to dismiss claiming that the plaintiff had not exhausted her administrative remedies by failing to file a complaint with the EEOC. "[P]laintiff asks this Court to ignore well settled law that aggrieved parties must exhaust administrative remedies before seeking relief from this Court under Title VII," Judge Ward wrote. He noted that the Plaintiff argued that the Supreme Court's opinion in Zipes v. Trans World Airlines, Inc., 455 U.S. 385 (1982). allows a court to maintain jurisdiction over cases in which there has not been a timely filing with the EEOC. In Zipes, the Court held that Title VII's statute of limitations for filing with the EEOC was not a jurisdictional prerequisite but rather a statutory condition precedent, and the Fifth Circuit has subsequently agreed that the receipt of an EEOC right-to-sue letter is not a jurisdictional prerequisite, but rather is a condition precedent subject to various equitable modifications. See Pinkard v. Pullman-Standard, 678 F.2d 1211, 1217-19 (5th Cir.1982) But whether treated as a matter of jurisdiction or as a statutory condition precedent, Judge Ward concluded that the plaintiff's unexplained failure to obtain a right to sue letter requires dismissal of this case. "Given that the plaintiff never filed a charge with the EEOC, this Court can find no exception to the statutory condition precedent under which plaintiff may be granted any equitable relief. Nor has the plaintiff cited any case that supports the proposition that a plaintiff who never submits a charge to the EEOC can proceed in federal court with her Title VII claim." Accordingly, the case was dismissed.

Full post as published by Eastern District of Texas Federal Court Practice on August 18, 2009 (boomark / email).