Opinion ID: 3011207
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Evans's Entitlement to Back Pay

Text: Title VII allows back pay awards when an employee does not leave her employment voluntarily. In this case, Evans must establish that she did not quit voluntarily; that is, that she was constructively discharged because a reasonable person would have found her working conditions intolerable. Durham contends that any actionable harassment occurred five to seven months before Evans left and thus that Evans deserves no back pay. The District Court found otherwise. According to itsfindings, the disappearance of Evans's files and the deprivation of her office right before she left constituted the culmination of a series of harassing events, making a formerly unpleasant job unbearable. Durham argues that Evans was not constructively discharged when she was forced to follow an office policy forbidding agents from having their own offices, the event that precipitated her departure. We disagree, for essentially the same reasons that we conclude that Evans suffered adverse employment action. Constructive discharge exists if the conduct complained of would have the foreseeable result that working conditions would be so unpleasant or difficult that a reasonable person in the employee's shoes 25 would resign. Goss, 747 F.2d at 887-88. Goss found that a reassignment to a less lucrative territory could constitute a constructive discharge, based on the substantial pay cut involved and the employee's loss of confidence in herself and her employer. See id. at 888-89. The facts here are quite similar. Although there is no need for a straw that broke the camel's back when the discrimination has continued over an extended time, see Aman, 85 F.3d at 1084, the loss of Evans's office and files constituted a substantial worsening of her working conditions at Durham. The District Court found that she could hardly have continued work at all without her files and money orders. Thus, the facts as determined by the District Court support the conclusion that Evans was constructively discharged.