Flesch v. County of Lake
- Susan Illston
- 3:21-cv-02018
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 3
In Flesch v. County of Lake, Judge Illston denied dismissal of five claims but dismissed the whistleblower-retaliation claim with leave to amend.
Daniel G. Flesch’s employment-related claims against the County of Lake were affected: five claims survived the dismissal motion, while the California whistleblower-retaliation claim was dismissed with leave to amend.
What happened
In Flesch v. County of Lake, Daniel G. Flesch sued the County of Lake and others, and the County asked the court to dismiss several claims in his amended complaint. The challenged claims involved religious discrimination, whistleblower retaliation, speech-related retaliation, and religious harassment.
The court denied the motion as to five claims: the federal religious-discrimination claim, both speech-retaliation claims, the California religious-discrimination claim, and the California religious-harassment claim. The court granted the motion as to the California whistleblower-retaliation claim because the complaint did not show compliance with California’s rules for presenting claims against a public entity or establish that the lawsuit was timely. The court dismissed that claim with leave to amend by December 21, 2021.
Judge Susan Illston issued the order on December 16, 2021. The order resolved only the County’s request to dismiss the claims at the pleading stage; it did not decide the ultimate merits of the claims that survived.
The detailed version
- Flesch v. County of Lake · No. 3:21-cv-02018
- Susan Illston
- Dec. 16, 2021
Background
The County of Lake moved to dismiss claims in Flesch’s first amended complaint. The motion challenged:
- religious discrimination under Title VII; - whistleblower retaliation under California Labor Code section 1102.5; - two claims alleging retaliation for exercising speech rights under Section 1983; - religious discrimination under California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act; and - religious harassment under that Act.
The court decided the motion without oral argument and vacated the hearing scheduled for December 17, 2021.
Claims That Survived
The court denied the motion as to the Title VII religious-discrimination claim, both Section 1983 speech-retaliation claims, the Fair Employment and Housing Act religious-discrimination claim, and the Fair Employment and Housing Act religious-harassment claim. The court found that the amended complaint alleged enough facts to plausibly support those claims rather than merely making speculative assertions.
Whistleblower-Retaliation Claim
The court granted the motion as to the California Labor Code section 1102.5 whistleblower-retaliation claim. For a state-law claim seeking money or damages from a public entity, California’s Government Claims Act generally requires the claimant to present a written claim to the public entity before filing suit. The court concluded that the amended complaint did not allege facts showing compliance with that requirement.
Flesch later submitted documents suggesting that claims had been delivered to the proper clerk. The court did not consider those materials sufficient to resolve the issue on the motion to dismiss. It also could not determine whether the lawsuit was timely because the complaint did not allege what response, if any, the County provided to the claim. California law required suit within six months after written action on or denial of the claim, or, if no written notice was sent, within two years after the claim accrued.
The court dismissed the whistleblower-retaliation claim with leave to amend and required any amended complaint to be filed by December 21, 2021. Judge Susan Illston did not determine the ultimate merits of that claim or of the claims that survived the motion.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.