Iskandar v. Mary Hitchcock Mem. Hosp.

2000 DNH 011

• Court: District Court, D. New Hampshire
• Decided: January 11, 2000
• Docket: CV-99-526-B
• Status: Published

Opinion

Iskandar v. Mary Hitchcock Mem. Hosp. CV-99-526-B 01/11/00 UNITED STATE DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF NEW HAMPSHIRE

Atif Iskandar

v. Civil N o . 98-526 Opinion N o . 2000 DNH 011 Mary Hitchcock Memorial Hospital

O R D E R

Construing Atif Iskandar’s response to Mary Hitchcock

Memorial Hospital’s motion for summary judgment in the light most

favorable to Iskandar, the only evidence in the record to support

a claim of national origin harassment i s : (1) testimony supplied

by a co-worker that on one occasion another non-supervisory co-

employee referred to Iskandar as a “sand nigger”; and (2)

Iskander’s testimony that on subsequent occasions, the same co-

employee stared at Iskandar and refused to speak with him. It is

undisputed that when Mary Hitchcock Hospital investigated

Iskandar’s claim, the co-employee denied making the statement.

Nevertheless, the Hospital informed the co-employee that such

statements would not be tolerated. There is no admissible evidence in the record suggesting that either the co-employee or

anyone else ever repeated the statements.

The evidence Iskandar cites is insufficient to support his

hostile work environment claim. He has not presented evidence to

show that he endured the kind of severe or pervasive harassment

necessary to establish a claim of national origin harassment.

Cf. Faragher v . City of Boca Raton, 624 U.S. 775, 778 (1998)

(noting, in sexual harassment context, that “‘sporadic use of

abusive language’” will not be sufficient to support a hostile

environment claim) (citation omitted); Schwapp v . Town of Avon,

118 F.3d 106, 110 (2d Cir. 1997) (“For racist comments, slurs and

jokes to constitute a hostile work environment claim, there must

be ‘more than a few isolated incidents of racial enmity.’”)

(quoting Snell v . Suffolk County, 782 F.2d 1094, 1103 (2d Cir.

1986)). As a result, Mary Hitchcock Hospital is entitled to

summary judgment with respect to this claim.

To the extent that Iskander also purports to state a claim

of national origin discrimination, i.e., he was terminated

-2- because of his national origin, his claim must be dismissed

because he has failed to exhaust his administrative remedies.

See Johnson v . General Electric, 840 F.2d 132, 139 (1st Cir.

1988). Moreover, summary judgment is warranted because Iskandar

has failed to produce any evidence suggesting that he was

discharged because of his national origin.

Iskander has abandoned his remaining claims. Accordingly,

defendant’s motion for summary judgment (document n o . 10) is

granted.

SO ORDERED.

Paul Barbadoro Chief Judge

January 1 1 , 2000

cc: Nancy Sue Tierney, Esq. Byry Kennedy Esq. Jeffrey Scott Brody, Esq.

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