Opinion ID: 803127
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Hostile Work Environment Requirements

Text: Under Title VII, it is “‘an unlawful employment practice for an employer . . . to discriminate against any individual with respect to his compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment, because of such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.’” Harris v. Forklift Sys., Inc., 510 U.S. 17, 21 (1993) (quoting 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(a)(1)). “This includes an employee’s claims of a hostile work environment based on race or national origin discrimination.” Herrera v. Lufkin Indus., Inc., 474 F.3d 675, 680 (10th Cir. 2007). We have recognized that “Title VII does not establish a general civility code for the workplace. Accordingly, the run-of-the-mill boorish, juvenile, or annoying behavior that is not uncommon in American workplaces is not the stuff of a Title VII hostile work environment claim.” Morris v. City of Colo. Springs, 666 F.3d 654, 663-64 (10th Cir. 2012) (internal quotes and citations omitted). “To survive summary judgment on a claim alleging a racially hostile work environment, [the plaintiff] must show that a rational jury could find that the workplace is permeated with discriminatory intimidation, ridicule, and insult, that -12- is sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter the conditions of the victim’s employment and create an abusive working environment,” and that the victim “was targeted for harassment because of [her] race or national origin.” Id. (brackets and internal quotation marks omitted). “The applicable test for a hostile work environment has both objective and subjective components. A dual standard asks both whether the plaintiff was offended by the work environment and whether a reasonable person would likewise be offended,” and both must be proved. Id. at 664 (internal quotes and citations omitted). “[There] is not, and by its nature cannot be, a mathematically precise test” for a hostile work environment claim. Harris, 510 U.S. at 22. Courts determine whether an environment is hostile or abusive by looking at such factors as “the frequency of the discriminatory conduct; its severity; whether it is physically threatening or humiliating, or a mere offensive utterance; and whether it unreasonably interferes with an employee’s work performance.” Id. at 23. “[T]he severity and pervasiveness evaluation [of a hostile work environment claim] is particularly unsuited for summary judgment because it is quintessentially a question of fact.” O’Shea v. Yellow Tech. Servs., Inc., 185 F.3d 1093, 1098 (10th Cir. 1999) (internal quotation marks omitted); E.E.O.C. v. PVNF, L.L.C., 487 F.3d 790, 798 (10th Cir. 2007) (same). -13- 2. Sufficient Evidence of Hostile Work Environment Viewing the record as a whole and in the light most favorable to Ms. Hernandez, we conclude that a rational jury could find that her workplace was permeated with discriminatory intimidation, ridicule, and insult that was sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter her conditions of employment. A rational factfinder could conclude that Ms. Hernandez experienced more than a “handful” of “sporadic” racially derogatory jokes and comments. Aplt. App. at 613. During the approximately fourteen months that Mr. Lillis supervised her, Mr. Lillis and Mr. Stillahn repeatedly subjected her to racially insensitive and offensive comments and jokes, including the Mexican-barbeque comment three to five times, the Mexican-tamale comment three or four times, and the black-Latino marriage comment at least once. In addition, Mr. Lillis accused her family member of being a murderer based on Ms. Hernandez’s surname, accused her family of not paying for lunch, and referred to a black cook using a racial epithet. Ms. Hernandez promptly and frequently complained to her supervisors about the offensiveness of the racial comments. See Herrera, 474 F.3d at 680-81 (noting plaintiff’s unheeded complaints of harassment to employer’s human resources attorney as evidence that she was subjectively offended). Ms. Hernandez marshaled sufficient evidence of both objective and subjective offensiveness to withstand summary judgment. See Herrera, 474 F.3d -14- at 680-81. A reasonable jury could find that Ms. Hernandez was offended by the work environment and that a reasonable person likewise would be offended.
The district court relied on Bolden, 43 F.3d at 551, in holding that Ms. Hernandez failed to demonstrate a “steady barrage of opprobrious racial comments.” “In Bolden, we held that only two overtly racial comments and one arguably racial remark over the course of the plaintiff’s eight years of employment did not constitute pervasive conduct.” Smith v. Northwest Fin. Acceptance, Inc., 129 F.3d 1408, 1414 (10th Cir. 1997). By our count, Ms. Hernandez presented evidence of at least a dozen racially offensive comments and jokes over the fourteen months Mr. Lillis supervised her in food services. 4 But “the word ‘pervasive’ is not a counting measure” and the “trier of fact utilizes a broader contextual analysis.” Herrera, 474 F.3d at 680 n.3. 4 Valley View asserts that Ms. Hernandez only established “three incidents with racial overtones that were directed toward her over a six year period.” Aplee. Br. at 29-30. In addition to including the years before Mr. Lillis began working at Valley View, it arrives at this lower number by parsing out the various instances of harassment and excluding some based on its characterization of them as racially neutral or not directed at Ms. Hernandez. As discussed further below, such parsing ignores the “‘totality of the circumstances’ test.” PVNF, 487 F.3d at 799; Penry v. Fed. Home Loan Bank of Topeka, 155 F.3d 1257, 1262 (10th Cir. 1998) (“Our precedents . . . eschew such a mechanical approach to analyzing hostile work environment claims.). Indeed, “the very term ‘environment’ indicates that allegedly discriminatory incidents should not be examined in isolation.” Id. -15- Considering the frequency, content, and context of the derogatory statements, we conclude that Ms. Hernandez established a genuinely disputed issue of fact as to the pervasiveness of the harassment in her work environment. See Smith, 129 F.3d 1415 (holding evidence of six sexually derogatory statements over twenty-three months, some repeated frequently, sufficient to support a finding of pervasive harassment). The district court, citing Ford v. West, 222 F.3d 767, 777 (10th Cir. 2000) (holding that vague, conclusory statements are insufficient), said that Ms. Hernandez provided “few specifics” to support her allegations of insensitive jokes and disparate treatment. Aplt. App. at 613. We disagree. Although Ms. Hernandez was not always able to give precise dates, she was often able to narrow the time frame to a particular month or time of year. She provided more specific details than the plaintiff in Ford, who only “baldly assert[ed] he was continuously subjected to racial slurs,” and provided no record citations to any “content, context or date of such slurs.” 222 F.3d at 777. Ms. Hernandez presented specific examples of her supervisors’ racial jokes, identified general time frames, and provided the relevant content and context of these comments.
Valley View argues that many of the alleged incidents were not directed at Ms. Hernandez. Although the record, viewed in the light most favorable to Ms. Hernandez, indicates most of them were directed at her individually or as part -16- of the Latino employees, we have held that derogatory comments need not be directed at or intended to be received by the victim to be evidence of a hostile work environment. See PVNF, 487 F.3d at 798. The “totality of the circumstances” is “the touchstone of [a hostile work environment] analysis.” Id. at 799; see also Harris, 510 U.S. at 23. “[E]vidence of a general work atmosphere, including evidence of harassment of other racial minorities may be considered in evaluating a claim, as long as [the plaintiff] presents evidence that [she] knew about the offending behavior.” Tademy v. Union Pac. Corp., 614 F.3d 1132, 1146 (10th Cir. 2008) (brackets and internal quotation marks omitted). It is unclear from the record whether Ms. Hernandez heard or was aware of the racially offensive references to the black cook. She testified, however, that she heard all the other racially tinged comments and jokes. And, contrary to Valley View’s assertion, the cook references are relevant to her claim whether or not they were directed at her personally. See McCowan v. All Star Maint., Inc., 273 F.3d 917, 925, n.10 (10th Cir. 2001) (holding that comments not directed at plaintiff, including a supervisor who called another worker the n-word, were relevant to the evaluation of hostile work environment claim). Valley View also argues that three of the incidents were not “racially motivated” and “cannot be considered” in the hostile work environment analysis. Aplee. Br. at 24-25. It characterizes Mr. Lillis’s accusation that Ms. Hernandez’s son or brother was a murderer was “nothing more than general teasing”; argues -17- that when Mr. Lillis asked Ms. Hernandez if her family paid for lunch, he might have been motivated simply by payment concerns; and asserts that Mr. Stillahn only “question[ed]” 5 Ms. Hernandez about the mess in the cafeteria because it was his job to ensure cleanliness. Id. Even if these incidents could be construed as racially neutral, Valley View’s argument fails. Hostile work environment “harassment must be racial or stem from racial animus.” Tademy, 614 F.3d at 1139 (brackets and internal quotation marks omitted). But Valley View misconstrues this circuit’s precedent in asserting these incidents should be excluded from our analysis. We have long held that “[f]acially neutral abusive conduct can support a finding of [racial] animus sufficient to sustain a hostile work environment claim when that conduct is viewed in the context of other, overtly [racially]-discriminatory conduct.” O’Shea, 185 F.3d at 1097; Penry v. Fed. Home Loan Bank of Topeka, 155 F.3d 1257, 1263 (10th Cir. 1998) (“Even where the motive behind the alleged conduct was not the plaintiff’s [race or national origin], the court may still consider that conduct relevant when evaluating whether ambiguous conduct was in fact 5 Valley View’s sanitized word choice falls short of conveying Ms. Hernandez’s evidence, which is that Mr. Stillahn said the “place looked like shit,” “was angry,” “started screaming,” “pushed the cart and kicked the door,” and that Ms. Hernandez “was afraid” and “tried to stay away from him.” Aplt. App. at 238. -18- [racially]-motivated or whether [racially]-motivated conduct was so severe [or] pervasive as to create Title VII liability.”). This is because what is important in a hostile environment claim is the environment, and [racially]-neutral harassment makes up an important part of the relevant work environment. Conduct that appears [racially]-neutral in isolation may in fact be [race]-based, but may appear so only when viewed in the context of other [race]-based behavior. Thus, when a plaintiff introduces evidence of both [race]-based and [race]-neutral harassment, and when a jury, viewing the evidence in context, reasonably could view all of the allegedly harassing conduct . . . as the product of [racial] hostility, then it is for the fact finder to decide whether such an inference should be drawn. Chavez v. New Mexico, 397 F.3d 826, 833 (10th Cir. 2005) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted) (holding that plaintiffs “can use a substantial amount of arguably [racially]-neutral harassment to bolster a smaller amount of [race]-based conduct on summary judgment”). Valley View’s argument that these three incidents were not based in racial animus “should take place before a jury that will have the opportunity to evaluate the evidence, demeanor, and candor of witnesses.” Tademy, 614 F.3d at 1146. Ms. Hernandez testified she was upset and offended by Mr. Lillis’s accusation that her family had not paid for lunch and that her son or brother was a murderer. She was so afraid of Mr. Stillahn’s anger when he blamed her for the kitchen mess that she tried to avoid him and was afraid to return. These incidents must be viewed in context and “cannot simply be discarded . . . but must be weighed on the side of reasonable inferences.” McCowan, 273 F.3d at 925 n.10. -19-