Dediol v. Chevrolet

Decision Date12 September 2011
Docket NumberNo. 10–30767.,10–30767.
Citation94 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 44267,655 F.3d 435,113 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. (BNA) 353
PartiesMilan DEDIOL, Plaintiff–Appellant,v.BEST CHEVROLET, INCORPORATED; Donald Clay, Defendants–Appellees.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

655 F.3d 435
113 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas.
(BNA) 353
94 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 44,267

Milan DEDIOL, Plaintiff–Appellant,
v.
BEST CHEVROLET, INCORPORATED; Donald Clay, Defendants–Appellees.

No. 10–30767.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

Sept. 12, 2011.


[655 F.3d 438]

John Courtney Wilson (argued), Metairie, LA, for Plaintiff–Appellant.Angella Hebert Myers, Mark C. Carver (argued), Myers Law Group, L.L.P., New Orleans, LA, for Defendants–Appellees.Gail S. Coleman (argued), U.S. Equal Opportunity Commission, Washington, DC, for Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, Amicus Curiae.Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.Before SMITH and STEWART, Circuit Judges.1CARL E. STEWART, Circuit Judge:

Plaintiff–Appellant Milan Dediol (“Dediol”) appeals the district court's grant of summary judgment for his former employer, Defendant–Appellee Best Chevrolet, Incorporated (“Best Chevrolet”), on his claims of hostile work environment and for constructive discharge. Because we find genuine issues of material fact, we REVERSE AND REMAND.

I.

Dediol was employed at Best Chevrolet from June 1, 2007, until August 30, 2007. During his tenure, he worked directly under Donald Clay (“Clay”), Best Chevrolet's Used Car Sales Manager. Dediol was 65 years old during his employment with Best Chevrolet, and he was also a practicing born-again Christian. Dediol alleges that, on July 3, 2007, friction surfaced between him and Clay when he requested permission to take off from work for the next morning—July 4, 2007—to volunteer at a church event. Dediol received permission from Clay's assistant manager, Tommy Melady (“Melady”), but Clay overruled Melady in derogatory terms. Dediol alleges that Clay told him, “You old mother* * * * * *, you are not going over there tomorrow” and “if you go over there, [I'll] fire your f* * * * *g ass.”

Dediol claims that after his request to take off from work for the morning of July 4th, Clay never again referred to him by his given name, instead calling him names like “old mother* * * * * *,” “old man,” and “pops.” Clay would employ these terms for Dediol up to a half-dozen times a day from on or around July 3, 2007, until the end of his employment. Dediol also claims that “[Clay] stole a couple of deals from me[,]” and directed them towards younger salespersons.

According to Dediol, Clay also began to make comments related to Dediol's religion. Examples of these comments include “go to your God and [God] would save your job;” “God would not put food on your plate;” and “[G]o to your f* * * *ng God and see if he can save your job.” Clay disparaged Dediol's religion approximately twelve times over the two months leading up to Clay's departure from Best Chevrolet. At one point, Clay instructed Dediol to go out to the lot to make sales by saying, “Get your ass out on the floor.” Dediol responded to this instruction by stating he was busy reading the Bible. To this, Clay responded “Get outside and catch a customer. I don't have anybody in the lot. Go get outside.”

[655 F.3d 439]

Clay also allegedly provoked fights with Dediol. On many occasions, there were incidents of physical intimidation and/or violence between Clay and Dediol. According to Dediol, Clay would threaten him in a variety of ways, including threats that Clay was going to “kick [Dediol's] ass.” On one occasion, Clay took off his shirt, and stated to Dediol, “You don't know who you are talking to. See these scars. I was shot and was in jail.”

Much of the complained-of conduct occurred in front of Melady. According to Dediol, by the end of July 2007, he requested permission from the acting General Manager (and New Car Manager), John Oliver (“Oliver”), to move to the New Car Department. To wit, Dediol also repeated the offending language in front of Oliver in the days leading up to, and when he made his request to change departments. Dediol avers that his request was precipitated by Clay's conduct. This request was preliminarily approved by Melady. Yet, when Clay learned of Dediol's request, Clay denied Dediol's transfer and stated, “Get your old f* * * * *g ass over here. You are not going to work with new cars.”

Tensions escalated and reached a climax at an office meeting on August 29, 2007. During an increasingly volatile exchange, Clay proclaimed, “I am going to beat the ‘F’ out of you,” and “charged” toward Dediol in the presence of nine to ten employees. Dediol continued working the balance of that day and the next. Allegedly, the next day, Dediol grew tired of his employment at Best Chevrolet and working under Clay. In a subsequent meeting with managers, Dediol stated, “I cannot work under these conditions—you are good people, but I cannot work under these conditions. It's getting too much for me.” Dediol stopped coming to work after August 30, 2007, after which he was terminated for abandoning his job. Dediol filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”) and he received his Right–To–Sue letter from the EEOC on July 8, 2008.

On August 22, 2008, Dediol filed suit in the Eastern District of Louisiana alleging the following claims: hostile work environment based on age, religion harassment and constructive discharge, and state law claims of assault, stemming from the August 29, 2007 incident. Best Chevrolet and Clay filed a motion for summary judgment, which the district court granted on July 20, 2010. Dediol timely appealed.

II.
A.

Summary judgment is appropriate where, considering all the allegations in the pleadings, depositions, admissions, answers to interrogatories, and affidavits, and drawing inferences in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party, there is no genuine issue of material fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). The moving party has the burden of demonstrating that there are no genuine issues of material fact in dispute. Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 323, 106 S.Ct. 2548, 91 L.Ed.2d 265 (1986). If the record, taken as a whole, could not lead a rational trier of fact to find for the nonmoving party, then there is no genuine issue for trial. Steadman v. Texas Rangers, 179 F.3d 360, 366 (5th Cir.1999). This court reviews the grant of summary judgment de novo. Floyd v. Amite Cnty. Sch. Dist., 581 F.3d 244, 247 (5th Cir.2009). We apply the same legal standards that the district court applied to determine whether summary judgment was appropriate. Lamar Adver. Co. v. Cont'l Cas. Co., 396 F.3d 654, 659 (5th Cir.2005).

[655 F.3d 440]

B.
1.

Title VII makes it “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, [age] or national origin.” 42 U.S.C.A. § 2000e–2(a)(1). The phrase “terms, conditions, or privileges of employment” includes requiring people to work in a discriminatorily hostile or abusive environment. Harris v. Forklift Sys., Inc., 510 U.S. 17, 21, 114 S.Ct. 367, 126 L.Ed.2d 295 (1993). For conduct to be actionable, it needs to be sufficiently “severe or pervasive.” Harvill v. Westward Comms., LLC, 433 F.3d 428, 434–35 (5th Cir.2005) (discussing Title VII discrimination in the sexual harassment context). Title VII has long been a vehicle by which employees may remedy discrimination they believe creates a hostile work environment. Rogers v. EEOC, 454 F.2d 234 (5th Cir.1971). In Rogers, this court was the first to recognize Title VII as a cause of action available to address a hostile work environment. Id. There, we considered an employee of Spanish origin who sought to address the employer's “practice of creating a working environment heavily charged with ethnic ... discrimination.” Id. at 238.

We have never before held that Title VII can be extended to address a claim for hostile work environment based on age but have considered the contention on two prior occasions. In Mitchell v. Snow, we considered the claim of an employee of the United States Department of the Treasury. 326 Fed.Appx. 852, 854 (5th Cir.2009). Following a yearly job-performance review, Mitchell brought suit claiming, inter alia, that her performance review amounted to discrimination under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (“ADEA”). In Mitchell, we affirmed a district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of the Treasury on the grounds that Mitchell had not satisfied her burden of production. We did not reach the question of whether a claim for hostile work environment under the ADEA was viable in this circuit.

This was also our posture in McNealy v. Emerson Elec. Co., 121 Fed.Appx. 29, 34 n. 1 (5th Cir.2005). In McNealy, we affirmed a district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of an employer and rejected all of plaintiff McNealy's claims. Id. There, too, we assumed arguendo the existence of a hostile work environment claim under the framework of the ADEA. Id. In both Mitchell and McNealy, we considered a plaintiff's age-based hostile work environment claim and affirmed the summary judgment of the district court in favor of the employer, without ever expressly adopting a cause of action for hostile work environment based on the ADEA.

At least one sister circuit has explicitly applied Title VII to a hostile...

To continue reading

Request your trial
216 cases
  • United States v. Dodd
    • United States
    • United States District Courts. 5th Circuit. United States District Court of Eastern District Texas
    • 10 Julio 2020
    ...circuit precedent confirming that the Sentencing Commission's policy statements are binding in section 3582(c) proceedings. See Garcia , 655 F.3d at 435 ("If a sentence reduction is inconsistent with a policy statement, it would violate § 3582(c) ’s directive, so policy statements must be b......
  • Nadeau v. Echostar, EP-12-CV-433-KC
    • United States
    • United States District Courts. 5th Circuit. Western District of Texas
    • 30 Octubre 2013
    ...591 (5th Cir. 1995). A plaintiff may bring a hostile work environment claim under the ADEA and/or the ADA. Dediol v. Best Chevrolet, Inc., 655 F.3d 435, 441 (5th Cir. 2011) ("We now hold that a plaintiff's hostile work environment claim based on age discrimination under the ADEA may be adva......
  • Sagar v. Lew, Civil Action No. 14-1058 (RDM)
    • United States
    • United States District Courts. United States District Court (Columbia)
    • 30 Septiembre 2016
    ...Six alleges "[h]arassment." The Court will construe this as an ADEA hostile work environment claim. See Dediol v. Best Chevrolet, Inc. , 655 F.3d 435, 440–41 (5th Cir.2011) ; Ware v. Hyatt Corp. , 80 F.Supp.3d 218, 226–27 & n.5 (D.D.C. 2015).Now pending before the Court are the Department's......
  • Collins v. Compass Grp., Inc.
    • United States
    • United States District Courts. 11th Circuit. United States District Court of Northern District of Alabama
    • 16 Agosto 2013
    ...have found that it is cognizable.FN2 Compare Collazo v. Nicholson, 535 F.3d 41, 44 (1st Cir.2008), with Dediol v. Best Chevrolet, Inc., 655 F.3d 435, 441 (5th Cir.2011), and Crawford v. Medina Gen. Hosp., 96 F.3d 830, 834–35 (6th Cir.1996).FN3 2. Similar to the Eleventh Circuit, the Seventh......
  • Request a trial to view additional results
9 books & journal articles
  • The law
    • United States
    • James Publishing Practical Law Books Age Discrimination Litigation
    • 28 Abril 2022
    ...without deciding that a hostile work environment claim based on age, could be brought under the ADEA); Dediol v. Best Chevrolet , Inc., 655 F.3d 435, 441 (5th Cir. 2011); Brown v. Metropolitan Govt. of Nashville and Davidson Cty. , 722 Fedd. Appx. 520, 524 (6th Cir. 2018); Trask v. Secretar......
  • Constructive Discharge
    • United States
    • James Publishing Practical Law Books Archive Texas Employment Law. Volume 1 - 2014 Part I. The Employment Relationship
    • 16 Agosto 2014
    ...a fact issue as to whether plaintiff was constructively discharged. • Physical threats of violence . In Dediol v. Best Chevrolet, Inc. , 655 F.3d 435, 444-45 (5th Cir. 2011), the Fifth Circuit held that plaintiff could survive summary judgment where the evidence showed that workplace “[t]en......
  • Table of cases
    • United States
    • James Publishing Practical Law Books Archive Texas Employment Law. Volume 2 - 2016 Part VIII. Selected Litigation Issues
    • 27 Julio 2016
    ...1988, no writ), §41:10.C De Cintio v. Westchester County Med. Ctr. , 807 F.2d 304 (2d Cir. 1986), §20:4.G Dediol v. Best Chevrolet, Inc. , 655 F.3d 435, 444-45 (5th Cir. 2011), §4:2.A.1.a Deep Water Slender Wells v. Shell Int’l Exploration & Prod. , 234 S.W.3d 679 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th D......
  • Constructive Discharge
    • United States
    • James Publishing Practical Law Books Archive Texas Employment Law. Volume 1 - 2017 Part I. The employment relationship
    • 9 Agosto 2017
    ...a fact issue as to whether plainti൵ was constructively discharged. • Physical threats of violence . In Dediol v. Best Chevrolet, Inc. , 655 F.3d 435, 444-45 (5th Cir. 2011), the Fifth Circuit held that plainti൵ could survive summary judgment where the evidence showed that workplace “[t]ensi......
  • Request a trial to view additional results

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT