Where a plaintiff has brought claims under Title VII and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, those claims must be dismissed because the plaintiff failed to bring them first in a timely fashion to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
“Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of race and gender (among other personal characteristics), and it authorizes aggrieved persons to bring lawsuits to enforce its terms. ... The Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) provides similar protection against age discrimination. ... A lawsuit, however, is not Congress’s preferred first resort for the enforcement of Title VII and ADEA rights. A person seeking to enforce her rights under Title VII or the ADEA must first turn to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and follow its administrative rules to seek a remedy.
“Plaintiff Mary Billings, an African American woman over 40 years of age, was fired from her job in the human resources department at defendant The Ideal Group. She believes her race and age played a role in her employer’s decision. However, Billings did not bring her complaint to the EEOC until the filing deadline had passed. Consequently, the federal claims that she has alleged in her complaint in this Court must be dismissed. She also has brought claims under state law, but the Court will decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over them. The defendant has filed a motion styled alternatively as a challenge to subject matter jurisdiction and to the sufficiency of the complaint, and a motion for partial summary judgment, all based in part on the timeliness of the plaintiff’s agency filings. The issues presented are addressed adequately by the parties’ briefing, and oral argument will not aid in the disposition of the motion. The motion therefore will be decided on the papers submitted. E.D. Mich. LR 7.1(f)(2). Because the plaintiff did not comply with the agency filing deadline, the defendant’s motion for partial summary judgment or to dismiss will be granted in part.
“The plaintiff’s complaint indicates that she was terminated by the defendant on February 9, 2022. ... As stated above, the plaintiff signed and submitted the charge to the EEOC on December 15, 2022. ... The charge also confirms that the discriminatory activity concluded on February 9 of that year. Ibid. Calculating the time with reference to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 6(a)(1) excluding the day of the triggering event and including the last date of the period December 15, 2022 was 309 days after the plaintiff’s termination, exceeding by nine days the applicable 300-day deadline.
“Somewhat remarkably, the plaintiff does not address this deficiency in her response. Instead, it appears that she believes that there is no timeliness problem because she filed her lawsuit within 90 days of receiving a right to sue letter from the EEOC. That fact, although true, confuses the issues. To maintain a lawsuit, a plaintiff is required both to file a timely charge with the EEOC and to file a lawsuit within 90 days of receiving the right to sue letter from the EEOC. Billings did not do the former. Generously construed, her argument might be an attempt to suggest that the EEOC’s decision to recall its previous dismissal of her charge and issue a right to sue letter, means that the EEOC determined her charge was timely filed. This argument is unavailing because ‘courts have generally made an independent review of the timeliness of the agency filing.’ Goldman v. Sears, Roebuck & Co ., 607 F.2d 1014, 1017 (1st Cir. 1979). And the undisputed record shows that the charge was filed beyond the 300-day benchmark. The charge was not timely.”
Billings v. The Ideal Group Inc.; MiLW 02-107982, 13 pages; U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan; Lawson, J.
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