Reported / Citable
Background
Shalinda Shunta Kendricks, an African-American former Texas Works Advisor at the Texas Department of Health and Human Services, alleged that a white coworker racially harassed her beginning in February 2022. Kendricks said she reported the conduct to supervisors and senior personnel, requested remote work as workplace tensions escalated, and was later fired.
According to the complaint, the agency cited an accusation that Kendricks recorded another employee in a bathroom, disruption in the office, and creating an unsafe environment. Kendricks alleged that those reasons were unfounded and that employees of other races received investigations of their complaints while hers did not. She asserted federal constitutional and Title VII claims, a Texas whistleblower claim, and tort claims.
The Court’s Holding
Magistrate Judge Dan N. MacLemore recommended granting the defendants’ motion to dismiss the first amended complaint in full. The recommendation concluded that sovereign immunity deprived the federal court of jurisdiction over the Section 1983 and Fourteenth Amendment claims, Texas Whistleblower Act claim, and tort claims against Texas and the individual defendants in their official capacities.
The recommendation further concluded that Texas’s waivers under its whistleblower statute and tort scheme did not extend to federal court. It also found that the Texas Tort Claims Act required dismissal of the tort claims against the individual employees once Kendricks sued both the State and its employees. The remaining claims were recommended for dismissal because Kendricks’s response challenged only the motion’s timing and did not defend the claims’ merits, constituting abandonment.
Key Takeaways
- The document is a magistrate judge’s recommendation, not a final district-court dismissal order.
- Texas’s consent to whistleblower and tort suits in its own courts did not waive Eleventh Amendment immunity in federal court.
- A plaintiff who responds to a dismissal motion but does not address its merits may be found to have abandoned the claims.
Why It Matters
The recommendation illustrates the jurisdictional limits on employment-related claims against Texas agencies and officials in federal court. It also underscores that plaintiffs must substantively answer dismissal arguments; procedural objections alone may leave otherwise viable claims treated as abandoned.