Opinion ID: 64984
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Hill’s Hostile Work Environment Claim

Text: Hill argues that the district court erred in dismissing his hostile work environment claim for failure to exhaust administrative remedies. Prior to 5 No. 08-60532 initiating this suit in federal court, Hill had filed an administrative complaint with the Department, claiming age discrimination with respect to the nonrenewal of his clinical privileges and his placement on involuntary leave. He later amended this administrative complaint to include a claim for forced retirement and constructive discharge, but did not add a hostile work environment claim. An ADEA plaintiff who, like Hill, “chooses to pursue an administrative remedy, . . . must see it through to the end.” Tolbert v. United States, 916 F.2d 245, 249 (5th Cir. 1990) (holding that a former postal employee who files an administrative complaint against the postal service alleging sexual harassment must exhaust her administrative remedies before commencing an action in federal court); see also Herod v. Potter, 255 F. App’x 894, 896 (5th Cir. 2007) (applying requirement of exhaustion of administrative remedies to federal employee alleging ADEA claim). Therefore, Hill was required to exhaust his administrative remedies with respect to all claims before filing a civil action. When a claim was not formally raised in the administrative proceedings, the exhaustion requirement may still be satisfied as long as an administrative investigation of the claim not raised could “reasonably be expected to grow out of” the charges actually raised. Pacheco v. Mineta, 448 F.3d 783, 789 (5th Cir. 2006) (quotation omitted). We examine a hostile work environment claim under a “totality-of-the-circumstances test that focuses on the frequency of the discriminatory conduct; its severity; whether it is physically threatening or humiliating[;] and whether it unreasonably interferes with an employee’s work performance.” Turner v. Baylor Richardson Med. Ctr., 476 F.3d 337, 347 (5th Cir. 2007) (quotation and alterations omitted). Hill’s administrative charges only alleged three specific discriminatory events—the non-renewal of Hill’s clinical privileges, the decision to place Hill on administrative leave, and his 6 No. 08-60532 “constructive discharge.” We agree with the district court that an investigation concerning the existence of a hostile work environment would not “reasonably be expected to grow out of” these allegations of discrete acts of discrimination. See Gates v. Lyondell Petrochemical Co., 227 F. App’x 409, 409 (5th Cir. 2007) (holding that the plaintiff’s “hostile environment . . . claim[] could not be expected to grow out of her [administrative] discrimination charge when she charged only her employer’s discrete acts in terminating and failing to promote her, and made no mention of a hostile work environment”). Accordingly, the district court properly dismissed Hill’s hostile work environment claim for failure to exhaust administrative remedies.