Opinion ID: 203640
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: When Did the Statutory Clocks Start to Run?

Text: Liberty Mutual argues that the statutes of limitations began to run on Tobin's reasonable accommodation claim when the company first rejected his requests for MM accounts and additional support staff. It is undisputed that those initial denials occurred no later than 1997, and the company asserts that no rationale exists for extending the limitations period beyond the initial statutory term. Hence, Liberty Mutual maintains that Tobin's reasonable accommodation claim had expired by the time he filed his administrative complaint in July 2001. In response, Tobin argues that his claim was timely both under the continuing violation doctrine and because the company denied his renewed requests for accommodation within the statutory periods. Although we agree that Tobin's claim may be timely even though his accommodation requests were first denied four years before he filed his administrative complaint, his reliance on the continuing violation doctrine is misplaced.
A party alleging employment discrimination may, in appropriate circumstances, file suit based on events that fall outside the applicable statutes of limitation. Morgan, 536 U.S. at 116-117, 122 S.Ct. 2061; Ocean Spray Cranberries, 808 N.E.2d at 266-67. Under the continuing violation doctrine, a plaintiff may obtain recovery for discriminatory acts that otherwise would be time-barred so long as a related act fell within the limitations period. However, it is now well established that the doctrine does not apply to discrete acts of alleged discrimination that occur on a particular day, but only to discriminatory conduct that takes place over a series of days or perhaps years. Morgan, 536 U.S. at 115, 122 S.Ct. 2061; see also Rivera, 331 F.3d at 188 (noting Morgan 's holding that a discrete discriminatory act transpires only at the time it takes place, even if it was related to acts that were timely filed); Cherosky v. Henderson, 330 F.3d 1243, 1246 (9th Cir. 2003) ( Morgan makes clear that claims based on discrete acts are only timely where such acts occurred within the limitations period....). [7] The classic example of a continuing violation is a hostile work environment, which is composed of a series of separate acts that collectively constitute one `unlawful employment practice.' Morgan, 536 U.S. at 117, 122 S.Ct. 2061 (quoting 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-5(e)(1)). The continuing violation doctrine applies in that setting because hostile work environment claims by [t]heir very nature involve[] repeated conduct, and a single act of harassment may not be actionable on its own. Id. at 115, 122 S.Ct. 2061; see also Ledbetter v. The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., 550 U.S. 618, 127 S.Ct. 2162, 2175, 167 L.Ed.2d 982 (2007) ([A] hostile work environment claim `cannot be said to occur on any particular day' because the actionable wrong is the environment, not the individual acts that, taken together, create the environment. (quoting Morgan, 536 U.S. at 115-116, 122 S.Ct. 2061)). Thus, component acts of a hostile work environment claim that occur outside the filing period may be considered for purposes of determining liability. Morgan, 536 U.S. at 117, 122 S.Ct. 2061. By contrast, the denial of a disabled employee's request for accommodation starts the clock running on the day it occurs. As we have noted, such a denial is a discrete discriminatory act that, like a termination, a refusal to transfer, or a failure to promote, does not require repeated conduct to establish an actionable claim. Consequently, the continuing violation doctrine does not apply to this case, and the timeliness of Tobin's claim turns solely on whether an actionable denial of his request for accommodations occurred during the limitations periods. [8]
Liberty Mutual asserts that Tobin's claim was untimely because the statutory periods began to run when the company first refused to give him MM accounts. Citing numerous cases, it argues that a plaintiff may not delay or restart the limitations period by making repeated requests for the same accommodation. We reject that understanding of the law. It is settled that an employee may not extend or circumvent the limitations period by requesting modification or reversal of an employer's prior action. Delaware State Coll. v. Ricks, 449 U.S. 250, 261 n. 15, 101 S.Ct. 498, 66 L.Ed.2d 431 (1980) (Mere requests to reconsider ... cannot extend the limitations periods applicable to the civil rights laws.). However, it is apparent from the Supreme Court's discussions in Morgan and Ledbetter that an employee who renews his request for particular accommodations may bring suit based on a new discrete act of discrimination if the employer again denies his request. In Morgan, the Court explicitly stated that [t]he existence of past acts and the employee's prior knowledge of their occurrence ... does not bar employees from filing charges about related discrete acts so long as the acts are independently discriminatory and charges addressing those acts are themselves timely filed. 536 U.S. at 113, 122 S.Ct. 2061; see also Ledbetter, 127 S.Ct. at 2174 ([A] freestanding violation may always be charged within its own charging period regardless of its connection to other violations.). Liberty Mutual's argument misapprehends the difference between instances in which the employer commits multiple acts, each of which is independently discriminatory, and those circumstances in which an employee attempts to rely on either the ongoing effects of the employer's single discriminatory act or the employee's efforts to obtain reversal of that singular act of alleged discrimination. Three cases cited by Liberty Mutual help to illuminate that distinction. In Cherosky, 330 F.3d at 1244, the Ninth Circuit addressed the accommodation claims of four postal employees whose requests to use respirators on the job had been denied. The employees, who brought suit four years later, acknowledged that their claims were based on conduct  i.e., the denial  that occurred outside the applicable limitations period. Id. at 1245-46. They argued that the denial date was not determinative because of the ongoing effect of the Postal Service's allegedly discriminatory no-respirator policy. Id. at 1246. Relying on Morgan, the court rejected their attempt to extend the limitations period, concluding that the alleged wrong here occurred and accrued when the policy was invoked to deny an individual employee's request. Id. at 1247. Significantly, however, the court observed that the employees were not without a remedy because if a new request [for respirators] results in a denial, the time period begins to run anew. Id. at 1248. The Second Circuit in Elmenayer, 318 F.3d at 135, similarly drew a distinction between the continuing impact of an employer's rejection of an employee's requested accommodation and the discrete act that started the running of the statute of limitations. The employee in that case, a truck driver, had requested a schedule change as an accommodation of his religious observance, but his employer denied the proposal as inconsistent with company rules. Id. at 132. The court, also relying on Morgan, held that the statute was triggered by the original denial of the employee's request, even though the effect of the employer's rejection continues to be felt by the employee for as long as he remains employed. Id. at 135. The court emphasized that, once the employer rejected the employee's proposed accommodation, it took no further action concerning his interest in attending prayer sessions. Id. Referring to Morgan 's holding that the timeliness of discrete acts such as transfers or promotions turns on the day the decisions are made, the Second Circuit observed that the continued enforcement of scheduling rules is no different, for time-bar purposes, than an employer's continuation of an employee in a position from which he had sought promotion or transfer. Id. However, like the court in Cherosky, the Second Circuit recognized that different considerations would exist if the employee renew[ed] the request for an accommodation within the limitations period. Id. The court declined to decide the effect of those different circumstances. In both Cherosky and Elmenayer, the employers committed one allegedly discriminatory act that had continuous impact on individuals who did not make renewed proposals for accommodation during the applicable limitations periods. In De Leon Otero v. Rubero, 820 F.2d 18, 19 (1st Cir. 1987), we confronted the situation of an employee who alleged a discriminatory discharge and sought to bring his claim within the statute of limitations based on his subsequent efforts to secure reversal of the original decision. We observed that the employer's refusal to rehire the plaintiff after his termination was not a separate act of discrimination, but rather a consequence of his initial demotion. Id. at 20; see also Martin v. Sw. Va. Gas Co., 135 F.3d 307, 310 (4th Cir.1998) (An employer's refusal to undo a discriminatory decision is not a fresh act of discrimination.) (citation omitted); Zdziech v. DaimlerChrysler Corp., 114 Fed. App'x 469, 471 (3d Cir.2004) (The repeated refusal of an employer to reinstate an employee to a formerly held position ... does not give rise to a new claim of discrimination.); Long v. Howard Univ., 512 F.Supp.2d 1, 17 (D.D.C.2007) (noting the distinction between new discrete acts of discrimination within the limitations period, and requests for reconsideration of a previously denied request, which may not revive a time-barred claim). Tobin's allegations here are materially different from those in the cases we have described. He alleges that Liberty Mutual consistently denied his repeated requests for accommodations and asserts that each denial constituted a discrete act that was the basis for a separate claim of discrimination and carried with it a new statute of limitations. The correctness of his view is the inevitable teaching of the Supreme Court's cases in this area. In Ledbetter, the Court emphasized that [a] new violation does not occur, and a new charging period does not commence, upon the occurrence of subsequent nondiscriminatory acts that entail adverse effects resulting from ... past discrimination. 127 S.Ct. at 2169. However, if an employer engages in a series of acts each of which is intentionally discriminatory, then a fresh violation takes place when each act is committed. Id. Indeed, in the context of disability discrimination, any other approach would fail to take into account the possibility of changes in either the employee's condition or the workplace environment that could warrant a different response from the employer to renewed requests for accommodation. Thus, the question we must answer is whether any of Tobin's requests for accommodation occurred during the applicable statutory periods. Before turning to that question, however, we briefly address Tobin's argument that the statute of limitations never began to run on his accommodation requests because Liberty Mutual never outright told him he could not have MM accounts. We deem Liberty Mutual's response an unequivocal denial of Tobin's request for accommodation. He was told, repeatedly, that he would not be given such accounts because he did not qualify for them. [9] In other words, Liberty Mutual unconditionally denied Tobin's request that he be given such accounts as an accommodation and left no doubt that he would have to meet the same eligibility criteria as every other employee. The statute thus ran on any requests made and denied on that basis outside of the applicable statutory periods. [10]