Cases & Developments

Opinion Denying in Part Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss. Plaintiff, a tenured professor at the University of Illinois Chicago School of Law, sued several university officials bringing First Amendment retaliation, Fourteenth Amendment due process, and state law defamation claims after an internal investigation concluded that he violated the school’s nondiscrimination policy based on an exam hypothetical referencing racial slurs, racially insensitive classroom remarks, and intimidating comments he made in response to student criticism. The court denied defendants’ motion to dismiss plaintiff’s First Amendment retaliation claim, holding that it fell within the Ex parte Young exception to Eleventh Amendment immunity because plaintiff sought prospective relief in the form of expungement of the investigation findings from his employment record. However, the court dismissed plaintiff’s Fourteenth Amendment due process claims, finding that he had no entitlement to the 2% merit raise he claimed was withheld and that reputational harm alone did not establish a constitutional liberty interest. The court also dismissed plaintiff’s defamation claims based on an internal investigation findings letter that stated plaintiff had used racial slurs, denounced minorities participation in civil rights, and had referred to minorities as “cockroaches.” The court concluded that those statements were “non-actionable” because a transcript confirmed plaintiff had, in fact, made those statements – and truth was a defense to defamation. But the court allowed the plaintiff’s other defamation claims to proceed, finding statements that plaintiff had engaged in race-based harassment, intimidated or threatened students, created fears of physical safety or retaliation, and made inappropriate comments in class could “reasonably be construed as objectively verifiable.”