Wash. Court of Appeals published opinion — 726668.pdf

presented that the County's asserted reasons were pretexts for discrimination.

Thus, the trial court properly dismissed Marin's claim of disparate treatment

based on protected status.

Disparate Treatment by Retaliation for Protected Activity

To establish a prima facie case of retaliation, Marin must show that he

engaged in statutorily protected activity, that he suffered an adverse employment

action, and that his protected activity caused the County to take the adverse

25 Marin instead cites to swathes of the record up to 120 pages wide.
These include a declaration by a former coworker, Norm Cook, alleging he and
Marin received disparate assignments from 2000-2003 due to their race. Those
events were outside the limitations period, and the trial court explicitly excluded
evidence regarding that period from trial.
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No. 72666-8-1/15

action against him.26 If Marin makes this prima facie showing, he must also show

that the County's legitimate reasons for its actions were pretextual.27

Here, too, Marin failed to present a prima facie case. First, he again failed

to show that he suffered an adverse employment action. "An actionable adverse

employment action must involve a change in employment conditions that is more

than an 'inconvenience or alteration of job responsibilities.'"28 This includes

"reducing an employee's workload and pay," but not, for instance, "yelling at an

employee or threatening to fire an employee."29

Marin cites Division Two's recent decision in Boyd v. State30 to contend

that the treatment he received, taken together, amounted to an adverse

employment action. In that case, Boyd showed that his employer, a state