In Revan v. University of Denver Department of Campus Safety, No. 25-CV-00528-NYW-CYC, 2026 WL 376809 (D. Colo. Feb. 11, 2026), the court, inter alia, denied defendant’s motion to dismiss plaintiff’s hostile work environment claim asserted under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
From the decision:
To state a prima facie claim for hostile work environment under Title VII, Plaintiff must plausibly allege that (1) he was discriminated against based on his sex and/or race; and (2) “the discrimination was sufficiently severe or pervasive such that it altered the terms or conditions of [her] employment and created an abusive working environment.”5 Ford v. Jackson Nat’l Life Ins. Co., 45 F.4th 1202, 1227 (10th Cir. 2022) (quotation omitted). Where, as here, a plaintiff alleges that he experienced discrimination based on multiple protected characteristics, the Court may “aggregate evidence of racial hostility with evidence of sexual hostility to establish a hostile work environment.” Smith v. Nw. Fin. Acceptance, Inc., 129 F.3d 1408, 1413 (10th Cir. 1997); see also Ford, 45 F.4th at 1227 (holding that aggregation is “permissible” but not required).
In evaluating whether the alleged discrimination rises to the level of a hostile work environment, the Court is mindful that “Title VII does not establish a general civility code for the workplace.” Morris v. City of Colo. Springs, 666 F.3d 654, 663–64 (10th Cir. 2012) (cleaned up). “Accordingly, the run-of-the-mill boorish, juvenile, or annoying behavior that is not uncommon in American workplaces is not the stuff of a Title VII hostile work environment claim.” Id. at 664. A plaintiff must point to a “steady barrage of opprobrious [discriminatory] comments” rather than “a few isolated incidents.” Lounds v. Lincare, Inc., 812 F.3d 1208, 1223 (10th Cir. 2015) (quotations omitted); see also Faragher v. City of Boca Raton, 524 U.S. 775, 788 (1998) (recognizing that “simple teasing, offhand comments, and isolated incidents (unless extremely serious)” do not constitute a hostile work environment (cleaned up)). A plaintiff must also “allege facts showing that the work environment ‘is both subjectively and objectively hostile or abusive.’ ”Brown v. LaFerry’s LP Gas Co., 708 F. App’x 518, 520 (10th Cir. 2017) (quoting Lounds, 812 F.3d at 1222). Courts therefore assess the alleged discriminatory conduct based on the totality of the circumstances, considering factors such as “the frequency of the discriminatory conduct; its severity; whether it is physically threatening or humiliating, or a mere offensive utterance; and whether it unreasonably interferes with an employee’s work performance.” Lounds, 812 F.3d at 1222 (quotation omitted). “Common sense, and an appropriate sensitivity to social context” should be used to determine whether the alleged conduct is such that “a reasonable person in the plaintiff’s position would find [the conduct] severely hostile or abusive.” Oncale v. Sundowner Offshore Servs., Inc., 523 U.S. 75, 82 (1998). But “whether the conduct was severe or pervasive is typically a question for the jury.” Throupe, 988 F.3d at 1252.
DCS contends that the conduct alleged in Mr. Revan’s complaint is “relatively tame in nature.” [Doc. 24 at 11]. In DCS’s view, Ms. Carney’s race- and sex-based comments “fall well short of even conduct described in prior cases that also did not measure up to a viable claim.” [Id.]. DCS does not identify those “prior cases” or compare Ms. Carney’s conduct to the conduct at issue in those precedents. Mr. Revan responds that Ms. Carney regularly made race- and sex-based comments to Mr. Revan, so the complained-of comments were neither “isolated” nor “few in nature.” [Doc. 26 at 8].6
DCS’s Motion does not appear to dispute whether the alleged harassment was based on a protected classification and subjectively offensive.7 Indeed, Ms. Carney’s comments were explicitly based on Mr. Revan’s race and sex. And Mr. Revan perceived her comments as subjectively offensive—he alleges the comments made him so uncomfortable that he requested to “change shifts” to avoid her. [Doc. 23 at ¶ 78]. As for whether the environment was objectively offensive, the Court agrees with DCS that the alleged conduct was not especially severe. But discriminatory conduct must be “either severe or pervasive” to be actionable; “it does not have to be both.” Morris, 666 F.3d at 665 (quotation omitted). In this context, the terms “severe” and “pervasive” “are, to a certain degree, inversely related; a sufficiently severe episode may occur as rarely as once, while a relentless pattern of lesser harassment that extends over a long period of time also violates the statute.” Brown, 708 F. App’x at 521 (quotation omitted).
Mr. Revan’s allegations of pervasive hostile conduct primarily focus on Ms. Carney’s behavior toward him. He alleges that during their frequent shifts together, Ms. Carney engaged in a campaign of unwanted romantic overtures despite Mr. Revan’s repeated requests that she stop. [Doc. 23 at ¶¶ 22, 25–26]. Ms. Carney made these comments on a “weekly basis” during at least four months of Mr. Revan’s roughly nine-month tenure at DCS.8 See [id. at ¶¶ 24–25, 29]. When Mr. Revan would “frequently” ask her to “stop harassing him,” Ms. Carney would respond, “[W]hat are you going to do about it? I am one of the only females in the department, they’ll never believe you over me.” [Id. at ¶ 26]. And when Mr. Revan finally did mention Ms. Carney’s behavior to Sergeant Malott, Sergeant Malott’s response confirmed Ms. Carney’s taunts. [Id. at ¶¶ 30–31]. Sergeant Malott expressly refused to investigate because Mr. Revan was male, Ms. Carney was younger and female, and Sergeant Malott believed his superiors would not believe Mr. Revan. [Id. at ¶ 31]. Moreover, Ms. Carney combined her sex-based harassment of Mr. Revan with (admittedly mild) race-based comments—i.e., repeatedly calling him an “old white man” who would “never understand her”—and sex-neutral harassment, such as her baseless assertions that she was “above” Mr. Revan and he needed to “fall in line.” [Id. at ¶¶ 23, 28]; see also Chavez v. New Mexico, 397 F.3d 826, 833–35 (10th Cir. 2005) (crediting incidents of “hostile and physically threatening conduct not necessarily connected to gender” in hostile work environment analysis, including making a false complaint of misconduct to a plaintiff’s employer).
The court concluded that “[t]hese allegations are consistent with other cases that have found a viable hostile work environment claim based on repeated harassment.”