By: Loyd Willaford and Matt Baker
In Gloetzner v. Lynch, a U.S. Deputy Marshall brought a suit alleging age discrimination under the ADEA against the U.S. Department of Justice. Marshall brought a number of claims of discriminatory treatment but all but one were all dismissed as having been brought too late. The one claim that the Court did not dismiss as timebarred was Marshall’s claim that he applied to be able to attend a firearms training session but was passed over in favor of a younger colleague. The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida granted the defendants motion for summary judgement, holding that the Marshall had not stated a meritorious claim on this.
Michael Gloetzner was a U.S. Marshall in the Northern District of Florida. He applied for the opportunity to attend a firearm training session, a session he had shown great interest in attending. However his supervisor, Assistant Chief Deputy York passed him over and chose a younger Marshall instead. York told Gloetzner that it made more sense to train the younger Marshall as he had at least 20 years of service left. In addition, Gloetzner had just attended a week long sex offender training, and was not positioned to attend another week long, out-of-town training.
Gloetzner brought a suit against the Department of Justice alleging that the denial of opportunity to go to the training was based on his age. He argued that York’s statement about the younger Marshall having 20 years of service left established a prima facie case of age discrimination. The court for the Northern District of Florida argued that his claims had no merit and granted the Department of Justice’s motion for summary judgement. The court held that denying Gloetzner the opportunity to go to the training was not an adverse employment action:
In this case, Plaintiff has not provided any evidence that his non-selection for the two trainings led to a decrease in his salary, changes in his work hours, or other material harm.
In addition, Gloetzner was unable to prove that the animus behind the decision not to send him to the training was discriminatory. He had just attended a different training, and it was not the policy of the U.S. Marshalls to allocate all trainings to certain individuals. Even the comment by York regarding the years of service that the younger Marshall had left was not discriminatory per se. A comment about years of service does not necessarily mean the same as a comment about age. Accordingly, the Court dismissed Gloetzner’s claim.
This case is an illustration of the difficulties federal workers face when making discrimination claims and the difficulties all workers can face under the federal Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA). Federal workers must file claims with the EEOC within 45 day of the discriminatory act. See 29 USC 633a(b); 29 CFR 1614.105. This is a very short time frame. In other employment contexts, employee have 180 days under federal law and 3 years under state law to bring claims. In addition, unlike the Washington Law Against Discrimination, the standard of proof for age discrimination under the ADEA is “but-for” meaning if the employer has some legitimate non-discriminatory motive for the action, the employee is likely to lose, but the employee will not be able to show that “but-for” the discrimination the action would not have happened.
The case also illustrate how courts use the lack of “adverse action” to dismiss claims. Under federal law, missing out on a training opportunity will not be an adverse action unless it has tangible effect on one’s career. Marshall was not able to show how the training would cause him “material harm.”
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