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March 19, 2026 Get Citation Alerts Download PDF Add Note

Freda Smith v. City of Hapeville

District Court, N.D. Georgia

• Citations: None known
• Docket Number: 1:24-cv-01002

• Precedential Status: Unknown Status

• Opinion

• Authorities (12)

• Cited By (0)

• Summaries (0)

• Similar Cases (0)

• PDF

Trial Court Document

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF GEORGIA

ATLANTA DIVISION

Freda Smith,

                Plaintiff,                                           
                             Case No. 1:24-cv-1002-MLB               

v.

City of Hapeville,

                Defendant.                                           

________________________________/

                 OPINION & ORDER                                     
Plaintiff’s  complaint  asserts  claims  for  “FMLA  interference”   

(Count 1), “FMLA retaliation” (Count 2), ADA “disparate treatment”
(Count 3), and ADA “retaliation” (Count 4). (Dkt. 1 at 8–11.) The
Magistrate Judge recommends granting Defendant’s motion for

summary judgment on these claims because Plaintiff did not address or

defend them in her response to Defendant’s motion. (Dkt. 58 at 7–9.)

No one objects to this well-supported recommendation, so the Court
adopts it. See Thomas v. Arn, 474 U.S. 140, 150 (1985) (district court

need not review unobjected-to portions of an R&R); Resol. Tr. Corp. v.

Dunmar Corp., 43 F.3d 587, 599 (11th Cir. 1995) (“[G]rounds alleged in

the complaint but not relied upon in summary judgment are deemed

abandoned.”).

That would normally be the end of the matter.  But, in her R&R       

objections, Plaintiff insists her complaint also asserts an ADA claim for
failure to accommodate her disability. (Dkt. 60 at 6–8.) She says this is

so because, even though she does not mention the claim in the formal

counts at the end of her complaint, her “factual allegations expressly

identif[y] Plaintiff’s disability, Defendant’s knowledge, a specific
accommodation request, and Defendant’s failure to engage in the

accommodation process.” (Dkt. 60 at 2, 8.) The Magistrate Judge

rejected this argument. (Dkt. 58 at 9–14.) So does the Court.

Plaintiff’s complaint does allege—albeit only tersely—that Plaintiff
had a disability, Defendant knew about it, Plaintiff’s doctor

“recommended to Defendant that Plaintiff be placed on light-duty,”
“Plaintiff was unable to return to work,” and “Defendant terminated

Plaintiff’s employment.” (Dkt. 1 ¶¶ 13, 24–25, 29, 39.) But the complaint

never “expressly” accuses Defendant of “fail[ing] to engage in the
accommodation process.” Plaintiff’s argument to the contrary doesn’t

even cite to the complaint and instead relies on the parties’ summary

judgment evidence. (See Dkt. 60 at 7.) The complaint also refers to the
doctor’s light-duty recommendation as an “accommodation” request only

once, only in Plaintiff’s ADA retaliation claim, and, even then, only as the
protected activity for which she was terminated. (Dkt. 1 ¶¶ 44–45.) That
Plaintiff explicitly invokes the concept of an “accommodation” request to

establish the protected activity required for her retaliation claim—but

otherwise says nothing about it—suggests she intended to use it only for

that limited purpose. That she lists four discrete counts at the end of her
complaint—but not one for failure to accommodate a disability—suggests

the same thing.

To be sure, the complaint does assert ADA counts for “disparate      

treatment” and “retaliation.” But these are “different types of
discrimination claims” than a failure-to-accommodate claim, both as pled

in Plaintiff’s complaint and more generally as a matter of law. Hausberg
v. Wilkie, 2021 WL 4133739, at *2 (M.D. Fla. Sept. 10, 2021). So, if

anything, their inclusion in the complaint signals Plaintiff’s intent to go

in a different direction than she is trying to go now. See Quality of Life,
Corp. v. City of Margate, 805 F. App’x 762, 767 (11th Cir. 2020) (ADA

claims for “disparate treatment” and “failure to provide a reasonable

accommodation” are “distinct grounds for relief”); Ford v. Marion Cnty.

Sheriff’s Off., 942 F.3d 839, 850 (7th Cir. 2019) (ADA claims for

“retaliation” and “denial of reasonable accommodation” require “proof of

different factual circumstances under different legal tests” and “courts

must treat them as distinct”); Murray v. Warren Pumps, LLC, [821 F.3d

77, 83](https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3197677/murray-v-warren-pumps-llc/#83) (1st Cir. 2016) (“failure to provide reasonable accommodations”

and “retaliatory discharge” are “distinct theories of disability

discrimination”); Green v. Nat’l Steel Corp., Midwest Div., 197 F.3d 894,
898 (7th Cir. 1999) (“a failure to accommodate claim is separate and

distinct from a claim of discriminatory treatment under the ADA” and is

“analyzed differently under the law”).1

1 See also Tessa G. v. Becerra, 2024 WL 5700923, at *2 (N.D. Ga. Sept.

18, 2024) (“Generally, a failure-to-accommodate claim under the ADA is

a discrete claim that must be exhausted separately from a discrimination

or retaliation claim.”); Jordan v. TJX, 2025 WL 790962, at *3 (S.D. Ala.

Mar. 12, 2025) (“Because they are based on different theories of liability,
claims under the ADA for disparate treatment disability discrimination

and denial of reasonable accommodation must be raised in separate
counts.”); Baker v. Hewlett Packard Enter. Co., 2019 WL 13154860, at *2

(N.D. Fla. Feb. 20, 2019) (“[A] failure to accommodate and disability

discrimination are two separate claims.”). The Court recognizes that

Quality of Life and other unpublished cases cited herein are not binding.

The Court cites them as instructive, nonetheless. See Searcy v. R.J.

Reynolds Tobacco Co., 902 F.3d 1342, 1355 n.5 (11th Cir. 2018)

(“Unpublished cases do not constitute binding authority and may be
relied on only to the extent they are persuasive.”).

As other courts have noted, where a complaint “contain[s]

background allegations that [defendant] failed to accommodate

[plaintiff’s] disability” but plaintiff does not “designate this claim as part
of her . . . delineated causes of action,” the allegations do not “afford the
opposing party fair notice” of the claim. Bell v. Shulkin, [709 F. App’x 167,

169](https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4426238/tempie-bell-v-david-shulkin/#169) (4th Cir. 2017); see Cacciamani v. Target Corp., 622 F. App’x 800,

804–05 (11th Cir. 2015) (complaint does not contain a claim if it does not

put defendant “on notice” of the claim). Or, put another way, “passing

references” to facts that might logically bear on a claim are not enough to
assert that claim where the plaintiff commits to different causes of action

in the formal counts at the end of her complaint. Winnie v. Infectious

Disease Assocs., P.A., 750 F. App’x 954, 960 n.3 (11th Cir. 2018) (although
plaintiff made “passing references to an accommodation in her

complaint,” she did not assert “an independent failure-to-accommodate

claim” because “her ADA claim [was instead] premised on a

discriminatory termination”).

That  is  what  we  have  here.    Plaintiff  may  have  pled  a  few 

accommodation-related facts. But she never packaged those allegations

as a discrete failure-to-accommodate claim, she did not include such a

claim in the counts at the end of her complaint, she asserted other claims
in those counts, and she explicitly tied her accommodation request to a

theory of liability—one asserted in her formal counts—that is “distinct”

from a “failure to accommodate claim.” Sutherland v. Peterson’s Oil

Serv., Inc., 126 F.4th 728, 741 (1st Cir. 2025) (a retaliation claim based

on the theory that plaintiff was terminated for making an

accommodation request, is “distinct” from a “failure to accommodate

claim”). Under these circumstances, even assuming it were possible to

cobble together a failure-to-accommodate claim from a handful of the

allegations scattered across Plaintiff’s complaint, Defendant was not

required to connect those dots. See Gilmour v. Gates, McDonald & Co., 382 F.3d 1312, 1315 (11th Cir. 2004) (defendant need not “infer all
possible claims that could arise out of facts set forth in the complaint”);

see also Monaghan v. Worldpay US, Inc., 955 F.3d 855, 859 (11th Cir.

2020) (complaint did not assert a retaliation claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1981 even though it “mentioned retaliation in passing” as part of a “claim

under 42 U.S.C. § 1981 for unlawful racial discrimination” and even
though it “asserted a Title VII retaliation claim”); Boone v. City of
McDonough, 571 F. App’x 746, 750 (11th Cir. 2014) (complaint did not

assert claims for harassment or hostile work environment even though it

referenced racist/sexist comments in the workplace, an atmosphere of

race/sex discrimination, plaintiff’s internal complaints about these
issues, and defendant’s failure to follow its harassment policy, and even
though plaintiff did assert claims for race/sex discrimination and

retaliation in the counts at the end of her complaint).2

Plaintiff did not assert a failure-to-accommodate claim in her

complaint, she cannot rely on that claim at summary judgment, she has

abandoned her other claims, and Defendant is thus entitled to summary

judgment. The Court OVERRULES Plaintiff’s Objections (Dkt. 60),

ADOPTS the Magistrate Judge’s Final Report and Recommendation

(Dkt. 58) (except for section II.B.2 of the Report and Recommendation,

2 The Court has reviewed the underlying complaints in Winnie,

Monaghan, and Boone. The Winnie complaint is particularly problematic

for Plaintiff because it invoked a failure-to-accommodate theory far more
explicitly than Plaintiff’s complaint does here. See Winnie v. Infectious
Disease Associates, P.A., 8:15-cv-2727-MSS-MAP (M.D. Fla. Oct. 5, 2016),

ECF No. 22. If its allegations were not enough to raise the theory there,
Plaintiff’s allegations cannot be enough here.

which addresses an issue the Court need not decide), and GRANTS
Defendant’s Motion for Summary Judgment (Dkt. 44).°
SO ORDERED this 19th day of March, 2026.

                            Ma L. BROWN 
                            UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE 

3 In section II.B.2 of the R&R, the Magistrate Judge found Plaintiffs
putative failure-to-accommodate claim is “barred as untimely.” (Dkt. 58
at 15-20.) The Court need not reach this issue because Defendant is
entitled to summary judgment regardless.