Lauren Grevich v. UNITED STATES FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE and UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF LABOR

United States Court of Appeals
For the Seventh Circuit
Chicago, Illinois 60604
Submitted March 9, 2023 *
Decided March 13, 2023
Before
FRANK H. EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judge
MICHAEL B. BRENNAN, Circuit Judge
AMY J. ST. EVE, Circuit Judge
No. 22-2855
LAUREN GREVICH,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
UNITED STATES FISH AND
WILDLIFE SERVICE and UNITED
STATES DEPARTMENT OF LABOR,
Defendants-Appellees.
Appeal from the United States District
Court for the Western District of
Wisconsin.
No. 21-cv-14-wmc
William M. Conley,
Judge.
* Appellee Department of Labor was not served with process in the district court
and is not participating in this appeal. We have agreed to decide the case without oral
argument because the briefs and record adequately present the facts and legal
arguments, and oral argument would not significantly aid the court. F ED. R. A PP.
P. 34(a)(2)(C).
NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION
To be cited only in accordance with FED. R. A PP. P. 32.1

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No. 22-2855 Page 2
O R D E R
Lauren Grevich was injured in 2010 while working at her job with the U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service. The Service agreed to accommodate her medical needs through
the end of August 2011. But on the day after her accommodation period ended, her
employment was terminated—ostensibly because the job, a student internship, had
ended. She unsuccessfully sought workers’ compensation through the U.S. Department
of Labor.
More than eight years later, Grevich filed an administrative complaint alleging
that her firing was disability discrimination. The Service dismissed her complaint as
untimely because she filed it well past 45 days after the supposed discrimination.
See 29 C.F.R. § 1614.105(a)(1).
Grevich then sued both agencies for firing her because of, and not compensating
her for, her workplace injury. The district court screened her complaint, see 28 U.S.C.
§ 1915(e)(2), and dismissed the Department of Labor because the statute governing
federal employees’ workers’ compensation prohibits judicial review of compensation
determinations. Fuqua v. U.S. Postal Serv., 956 F.3d 961, 964 (7th Cir. 2020) (citing
5 U.S.C. §§ 8116(c), 8128(b)(2), 8145). The court, however, allowed Grevich to proceed
with a disability-discrimination claim against the Service under the Rehabilitation Act
of 1973, see 29 U.S.C. § 794, reasoning that the Act is the only remedy for federal
employees claiming disability discrimination.
The court later granted the Service’s motion for summary judgment on the
ground that Grevich had not exhausted her administrative remedies to bring a
Rehabilitation Act claim because Grevich filed her complaint well after the 45-day filing
deadline. The court continued that equitable tolling did not apply because a reasonable
person in Grevich’s situation would have suspected the possibility of illegal
discrimination.
On appeal, Grevich has submitted a brief that is only minimally developed.
See FED. R. A PP. P. 28(a). We understand her to argue that the district court disregarded
her unique circumstances and subjected her to unreasonably strict deadlines. But this
argument does not engage with the court’s ruling that she failed to exhaust
administrative remedies and that equitable tolling did not apply. To the extent Grevich
says she was not certain about the discriminatory nature of her discharge until receiving
a letter years later from the Department of Labor about her workers’ compensation
claim, she misapprehends the doctrine of equitable tolling. A claim can be tolled only if

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No. 22-2855 Page 3
a party did not have access to information that would alert a reasonable person to the
possibility of illegal discrimination. Palmer v. Ind. Univ., 31 F.4th 583, 588 (7th Cir. 2022).
By the time her employment ended, a reasonable person in her position—one whose
boss treated her like “a whiner about [her] pain” and whose employment ended the day
after her accommodations did—would have been aware of the possibility that she had
been discriminated against illegally.
We have considered Grevich’s other arguments, but none is developed enough
to warrant discussion.
AFFIRMED

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