Faustin v. The New York and Presbyterian Hospital

Background

Pelege Faustin, an employee of The New York and Presbyterian Hospital (NYP), sued NYP and supervisor Miguel Artache. He alleged employment discrimination and retaliation under federal, New York State, and New York City laws. His claims included race discrimination under 42 U.S.C. § 1981; race and national-origin discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964; age discrimination under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act; and race, national-origin, and age discrimination under the New York State Human Rights Law and New York City Human Rights Law. He also asserted retaliation claims under those laws.

Faustin challenged NYP’s decision not to promote him to either of two CE Manager positions at its Columbia campus in 2022. Artache selected or offered the positions to Jamel “Melquan” Graves, Raymond Santana, and Richard Orellana. Faustin also claimed that NYP retaliated against him after he filed an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission charge on March 2, 2023, by disciplining him in June 2023 and December 2024. Faustin abandoned his race- and age-discrimination claims while opposing summary judgment. The defendants then moved for summary judgment on the remaining claims.

First Columbia Vacancy and Filing Deadline

The court granted the defendants’ motion concerning Faustin’s Title VII failure-to-promote claim for the First Columbia Vacancy. Title VII generally requires a discrimination charge to be filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission within 300 days of the challenged act in New York. Faustin filed his charge on March 2, 2023, so acts occurring before May 6, 2022, were outside the filing period. Santana accepted the First Columbia Vacancy on April 22, 2022. The court rejected Faustin’s argument that the continuing-violations doctrine made the claim timely, explaining that a failure to promote is a separate act with its own deadline.

National-Origin Discrimination

The court also granted the defendants’ motion on Faustin’s failure-to-promote claims under Title VII, the New York State Human Rights Law, and the New York City Human Rights Law. Applying the burden-shifting framework used in employment-discrimination cases, the court assumed that Faustin had established an initial discrimination case but concluded that he had not rebutted NYP’s nondiscriminatory explanation.

The evidence showed that Graves, Santana, and Orellana were selected based on their resumes, interviews, references, and experience with management, contracts, budgets, or equipment purchasing. The court found that Faustin did not produce evidence that his qualifications were superior or that national origin motivated the decisions. It rejected his arguments that discrimination could be inferred from Artache’s hiring of two Hispanic candidates, that NYP’s internal-candidate policies required selecting him, that NYP’s failure to interview him was significant, or that a lower performance review demonstrated discriminatory motivation. The court also noted that the first person offered a position was Black and that the other applicants selected had stronger qualifications on the record before the court.

Retaliation

The court granted the defendants’ motion on the retaliation claims under Title VII, the New York State Human Rights Law, and the New York City Human Rights Law.

For the June 2023 discipline, Faustin relied mainly on the short time between his March 2023 charge and the suspension. The court held that timing alone was not enough to show retaliatory intent. An investigation found that Faustin had not properly troubleshot a Bernoulli device, had recorded that he fixed it when it was not working properly, and had violated NYP’s conduct rules. An independent hearing officer denied his grievance, although the suspension was later reduced to a written warning. The court concluded that Faustin did not provide evidence that NYP’s stated reason was a pretext for retaliation.

For the December 2024 discipline, an audit found that Faustin and two other technicians had failed to complete assigned work orders. NYP suspended Faustin for one day and issued warnings to the other two employees because they did not have prior corrective actions. The court found no sufficient causal connection to Faustin’s March 2023 charge because approximately 21 months had passed, the investigation began with complaints from morning-shift employees, and NYP disciplined two other employees as well. The court separately noted that Faustin presented no evidence that Artache played any role in the December 2024 suspension.

Disposition

The court granted the defendants’ February 21, 2025 motion for summary judgment. The Clerk of Court was directed to enter judgment for the defendants and close the case.