# Casselle

> District Court, N.D. Illinois · March 19, 2026

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/11317324

## Case

- **Full name:** Omowale Casselle v. The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois, Bill Jackson, Jami Painter, and Annabelle Clarke
- **Court:** District Court, N.D. Illinois
- **Decided:** March 19, 2026
- **Opinion:** 100trialcourt
- **Cited by:** 0 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

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## Opinion text

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
EASTERN DIVISION

OMOWALE CASSELLE, )
)
Plaintiff, )
) No. 25 C 7712
v. )
) Judge Sara L. Ellis
THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES OF THE )
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS, )
BILL JACKSON, JAMI PAINTER, and )
ANNABELLE CLARKE, )
)
Defendants. )

OPINION AND ORDER
After Plaintiff Omowale Casselle, an African American, lost his position as the director
of the Pritzker Tech Talent Labs of the University of Illinois System’s Discovery Partner’s
Institute (“DPI”), he filed this lawsuit against Defendants the Board of Trustees of the University
of Illinois (the “Board”), Bill Jackson, Jami Painter, and Annabelle Clarke. In his first amended
complaint, he alleges that the Board engaged in race discrimination, harassment, and retaliation
in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (“Title VII”), 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq.
He also brings claims for race discrimination, harassment, and retaliation against all Defendants
in violation of § 1983. Defendants have moved to dismiss the § 1983 claims, as well as the Title
VII harassment claims, pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). Because sovereign
immunity bars Casselle’s § 1983 claims and he has not sufficiently alleged his Title VII
harassment claims, the Court dismisses these claims without prejudice.
BACKGROUND1
Casselle, an African American, served as the inaugural director of the Pritzker Tech
Talent Labs within DPI. He began this role in December 2020. DPI is part of the University of
Illinois System (the “System”). It conducts tech workforce development, applied research, and

business in Chicago. The Pritzker Foundation funded the DPI program with a $10 million grant,
with the intent to create opportunities within the technology field for 7,000 participants annually
by 2029 and to draw forty percent of those participants from underrepresented populations.
Jackson served as DPI’s executive director, Painter worked as the director of human resources
for the System, and Clarke worked as a director of administration for the System.
Casselle did not receive any negative evaluations during his employment and instead
received merit pay increases in 2021 and 2022. Beginning in November 2022, he began to
complain about what he perceived as race discrimination in the workplace. Specifically, he sent
several emails complaining about differences in the hiring, promotion, and management of White
and Black people and offering suggestions on how to mitigate the racially hostile environment at

DPI. He also advocated for participants in DPI’s apprenticeship program. For example, Casselle
learned that DPI leadership did not allow apprentices, who generally came from
underrepresented populations, to use DPI’s kitchen or refrigerators on the fourth floor of the
building and instead required apprentices to use facilities on the twentieth floor, allegedly
because apprentices “might steal food.” Doc. 9 ¶ 22. Casselle complained to leadership that
other employees and students could use DPI’s kitchen and break rooms on the fourth floor.
Casselle also learned that Jackson and another employee worried that apprentices would steal
laptops provided by the school and so discussed creating a policy to address the issue, even

1 The Court takes the facts in the background section from the first amended complaint and exhibits
attached thereto and presumes them to be true for the purpose of resolving Defendants’ motion to dismiss.
See Phillips v. Prudential Ins. Co. of Am., 714 F.3d 1017, 1019–20 (7th Cir. 2013).
though no evidence suggested that apprentices had actually stolen any laptops. Casselle
complained that Jackson’s assumptions and stereotypes implied “underlying criminality.” Id.
¶ 26. On another occasion, after Casselle heard a White employee accuse a Black apprentice of
smoking weed, Casselle asked the White employee why he made the comment, with the White

employee responding that while he had no evidence that the Black apprentice smoked weed, he
seemed “slow and wasn’t learning the material as fast as others.” Id. ¶ 28. During a team
dinner, Jackson asked for recommendations for scaling the DPI program, with one of Casselle’s
co-workers suggesting imposing more rigorous admissions standards. Jennifer Foil, DPI’s
director of workforce development, responded that this would mean accepting less Black people
into the program. Casselle complained that Foil expressed a racist viewpoint.
Casselle complained to Jackson, Painter, and Clarke about these instances of racism,
indicating they should not be tolerated. During one meeting with Jackson and Clarke, Casselle
told them that he “believe[d] DPI is a racially discriminatory environment that treats persons of
color differently.” Id. ¶ 41. Clarke and Painter routinely disciplined Black employees, placing

them on performance improvement plans without cause and applying policies and procedures
differently to Black and non-Black employees. Casselle specifically elaborated that a Black
woman did not receive a promotion because of racial stereotypes, but a White woman and a
White man avoided placements on performance improvement plans despite supervisors
documenting performance issues. Jackson, Painter, and Clarke ignored Casselle’s complaints,
and the System’s leadership did not make any changes or discipline those who made the
discriminatory remarks. Jackson even verbally attacked Casselle, prompting Casselle to take
time off due to emotional distress.
After Casselle complained about the discrimination, Jackson issued Casselle a sixty-day
letter of expectation, even though such letters typically had ninety-day timeframes. The
System’s policy also requires two years of performance reviews before placing an employee on a
performance improvement plan, but Casselle did not have any reviews before receiving the letter

of expectation. When Casselle asked Jackson about the deviation from policy, he stated that he
“wanted to shock the system.” Doc. 9 ¶ 55. Defendants also rescinded invites for meetings that
involved Casselle’s job tasks and excluded him from key personnel decisions related to his
responsibilities.
Casselle’s contract renewal date was August 15, 2023. On July 25, 2023, Casselle
verbally learned that DPI did not plan to reappoint him to his position. He complained about
being treated differently due to his race and having engaged in protected activity, and he also
filed a grievance. On August 7, 2023, Casselle received an email reiterating that DPI would not
reappoint him to his position. Although Casselle initially was told he had six months before his
contract ended, Painter reduced the six-month period to two months after Casselle complained

about discrimination. And immediately thereafter, Jackson told the head of DPI’s IT department
to terminate Casselle’s access to the building and delete his files, even though he had two more
months to work. DPI replaced Casselle with an Indian male who had not engaged in legally
protected activity.
LEGAL STANDARD
A motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6) challenges the sufficiency of the complaint, not
its merits. Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6); Gibson v. City of Chicago, 910 F.2d 1510, 1520 (7th Cir.
1990). In considering a Rule 12(b)(6) motion, the Court accepts as true all well-pleaded facts in
the plaintiff’s complaint and draws all reasonable inferences from those facts in the plaintiff’s
favor. Kubiak v. City of Chicago, 810 F.3d 476, 480–81 (7th Cir. 2016). To survive a Rule
12(b)(6) motion, the complaint must assert a facially plausible claim and provide fair notice to
the defendant of the claim’s basis. Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009); Bell Atl. Corp. v.
Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007); Adams v. City of Indianapolis, 742 F.3d 720, 728–29 (7th

Cir. 2014). A claim is facially plausible “when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the
court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged.”
Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678.
ANALYSIS
I. Sovereign Immunity
Defendants argue that they enjoy Eleventh Amendment immunity from Casselle’s § 1983
claims. The Eleventh Amendment bars suits brought against a state in federal court. Pennhurst
State Sch. & Hosp. v. Holderman, 465 U.S. 89, 98 (1984). Sovereign immunity does not apply
where the state consents to suit or federal legislation abrogates the immunity pursuant to a
constitutional grant of authority. Tennessee v. Lane, 541 U.S. 509, 517 (2004). The Court first

considers whether the Eleventh Amendment bars Casselle’s claims against the Board and then
turns to its effect on his individual capacity claims against Jackson, Painter, and Clarke.
A. Section 1983 Claims against the Board
Casselle does not seriously challenge Defendants’ argument that he cannot pursue his
§ 1983 claims against the Board. Indeed, “[s]tate universities, as well as their governing bodies,
are protected from suit under the Eleventh Amendment.” Mutter v. Madigan, 17 F. Supp. 3d
752, 757–58 (N.D. Ill. 2014) (citing Kaimowitz v. Bd. of Trs., 951 F.2d 765, 767 (7th Cir. 1991)),
aff’d as modified sub nom. Mutter v. Rodriguez, 700 F. App’x 528 (7th Cir. 2017). Therefore,
the Court dismisses Casselle’s § 1983 claims (Counts IV, V, and VI) against the Board. The
dismissal is without prejudice, given that Eleventh Amendment immunity goes to the Court’s
jurisdiction. See McHugh v. Ill. Dep’t of Transp., 55 F.4th 529, 533–34 & n.2 (7th Cir. 2022).
B. Section 1983 Claims against Jackson, Painter, and Clarke
Next, Defendants argue that despite Casselle indicating that he pursues his claims against

Jackson, Painter, and Clarke in their individual capacities, they are actually official capacity
claims and so also barred by the Eleventh Amendment. As the Supreme Court has explained,
individual capacity suits “seek to impose personal liability upon a government official for actions
he takes under color of state law.” Kentucky v. Graham, 473 U.S. 159, 165 (1985). “Official-
capacity suits, in contrast, ‘generally represent only another way of pleading an action against an
entity of which an officer is an agent.’” Id. (quoting Monell v. Dep’t of Soc. Servs., 436 U.S.
658, 690 n.55 (1978)). “Whereas in an official capacity suit the plaintiff alleges that the
defendant was party to the execution or implementation of official policy or conduct by a
government because the real party in interest is the entity, an individual capacity suit focuses on
the constitutional torts of an individual official.” Hill v. Shelander, 924 F.2d 1370, 1372 (7th

Cir. 1991). Here, Casselle challenges Jackson’s, Painter’s, and Clarke’s individual conduct in
allegedly discriminating and retaliating against him, not just the execution or implementation of
the System’s policies, and so the Court does not find it appropriate to recharacterize Casselle’s
claims against them as official capacity claims.
That does not end the inquiry, however, because Defendants alternatively argue that,
even treated as individual capacity claims, sovereign immunity bars the claims because Casselle
seeks the same damages against Jackson, Painter, and Clarke that he does against the Board.
While the Eleventh Amendment does not typically bar a claim against state officials in their
individual capacities, a plaintiff cannot seek “monetary relief from state employees in their
individual capacities if the suit ‘demonstrably has the identical effect as a suit against the state.’”
Haynes v. Ind. Univ., 902 F.3d 724, 732 (7th Cir. 2018) (quoting Luder v. Endicott, 253 F.3d
1020, 1023 (7th Cir. 2001)). In other words, sovereign immunity bars even individual capacity
suits where “the money will flow from the state treasury to the plaintiffs.” Luder, 253 F.3d at
1024.2

The Seventh Circuit has twice found that sovereign immunity bars claims against state
university officials sued in their individual capacities related to employment matters. See
Haynes, 902 F.3d at 731–32 (sovereign immunity barred § 1981 race discrimination claim
against university administrators); Omosegbon v. Wells, 335 F.3d 668, 673 (7th Cir. 2003)
(sovereign immunity barred due process and academic freedom claims brought under § 1983 by
a terminated former professor against university officials). These cases teach that “sovereign
immunity bars a state-employed plaintiff from bringing individual-capacity claims against state-
employed supervisors or coworkers who deprived him of rights, benefits, or opportunities arising
from his employment relationship with the state.” Melgaard v. Wis. Dep’t of Nat. Res., No. 24-

CV-561, 2025 WL 3268370, at *4 (W.D. Wis. Nov. 24, 2025). Because plaintiffs “seek to
recover the value of their state employment” in such cases, they are “effectively against the
state.” Id.
Casselle’s claims against Jackson, Painter, and Clarke for race discrimination,
harassment, and retaliation arising out of his employment at DPI appear to meet the parameters
set forth in Omosegbon and Haynes for sovereign immunity to apply. But Casselle argues that

2 The fact that the State would pay any damages assessed against Jackson, Painter, and Clarke pursuant to
the State Employee Indemnification Act, 5 Ill. Comp. Stat. 350/2, has no relevance to the inquiry and so
the Court does not address it further. See Luder, 253 F.3d at 1023 (“The fact that the state chooses to
indemnify its employees who are sued in federal court is irrelevant, because it is the voluntary choice of
the state, not a cost forced on it by the federal-court suit. . . . Indirect effects are not enough; otherwise the
practical necessity for a state to compensate an employee for bearing liability risks would place
individual-capacity suits under the bar of the Eleventh Amendment.” (citations omitted)).
the Court should find that his claims can proceed because he does not only seek lost wages and
benefits, which flow from his employment contract, but also requests compensatory damages
from Jackson, Painter and Clarke, including recovery for embarrassment, personal humiliation,
loss of reputation, and mental anguish and suffering.

Indeed, some courts have allowed claims to proceed where plaintiffs seek compensatory
and punitive damages from individual state employees. See, e.g., Sizyuk v. Purdue Univ., No.
4:20-CV-75, 2024 WL 68282, at *3–4 (N.D. Ind. Jan. 5, 2024) (allowing claims where the
plaintiff sought compensatory and punitive damages from individual state employee, not lost
wages or lost benefits); Calautti v. Shanahan, No. 118CV00119, 2019 WL 3717980, at *6 (S.D.
Ind. Aug. 7, 2019) (allowing complaint to proceed against individual state employees where the
plaintiff sought compensatory and punitive damages from the individual employees in addition
to lost wages and other financial losses); Reinebold v. Ind. Univ. at S. Bend, No. 3:18-CV-525,
2019 WL 1897288, at *3 (N.D. Ind. Apr. 25, 2019) (“‘Compensatory damages’ as a concept
includes recovery for embarrassment, personal humiliation, impairment of reputation, mental

anguish and suffering, etc. Even where a plaintiff seeks compensatory damages associated with
an employment contract, courts have declined to dismiss on sovereign immunity grounds where
the plaintiff also seeks to recover for these less tangible items.” (citation omitted)). Other courts,
however, have reasoned that the type of relief sought does not matter and that the inquiry should
remain focused on the substance of the plaintiff’s claims. See Smith v. Ill. Dep’t of Corr., No.
24-CV-5022, 2025 WL 744098, at *4 (N.D. Ill. Mar. 7, 2025) (“Nor does the Court believe that
the way a plaintiff pleads damages should be decisive as to whether a case is truly against the
state rather than individual defendants. To hold otherwise would allow plaintiffs to defeat a
sovereign immunity argument just by throwing in an allegation of emotional pain and
suffering.”); Melgaard, 2025 WL 3268370, at *5 (rejecting the plaintiff’s argument that his case
differed from Omosegbon and Haynes because he did not seek back pay but instead
“compensatory damages for lost income, injury to his personal reputation, mental and emotional
distress, as well as punitive damages”); Upchurch v. Indiana, No. 1:23-CV-01310, 2025 WL

2336851, at *5 (S.D. Ind. Aug. 12, 2025) (concluding that the plaintiff’s request for
compensatory and punitive damages did not “obscure the fact” that he based his claims against
individual state employees on the denial of employment opportunities he would have received
from the state if not for the alleged discrimination); see also Gerlach v. Rokita, 95 F.4th 493, 501
(7th Cir. 2024) (“Even if the sought after compensation would not definitively be paid out of the
state treasury, if the amount the plaintiff seeks ‘should have been paid by the State,’ the suit is
likely one against the state itself.” (citation omitted)). The Court agrees with the latter line of
cases that the focus should be whether a plaintiff’s claims against the individual state employees
“stem[ ] from the plaintiff’s state employment contract, not on whether the plaintiff[ ] s[eeks]
damages other than lost wages and benefits.” Hoffman v. Bd. of Regents, No. 23-CV-853, 2025

WL 1504376, at *5 (W.D. Wis. May 27, 2025).
Here, because Casselle’s claims all arise from his contention that Jackson, Painter, and
Clarke denied him opportunities that he would have received from the System absent racial
discrimination, harassment, and retaliation, his individual capacity claims arise from his
employment relationship. As such, sovereign immunity bars Casselle’s claims against Jackson,
Painter, and Clarke in their individual capacities. See Smith, 2025 WL 744098, at *3 (sovereign
immunity barred claims against individual state employees alleging “constitutional violations
premised on [the plaintiff’s] employment relationship with the state”); Hoffman, 2025 WL
1504376, at *5 (finding plaintiff’s hostile work environment, discrimination, and retaliation
claims against individual state employees barred by sovereign immunity). The Court therefore
dismisses Casselle’s claims against Jackson, Painter, and Clarke (Counts II, IV, V, VI, VIII, IX)
without prejudice.
II. Title VII Harassment Claims

Finally, Defendants argue that Casselle has not pleaded an actionable Title VII racial or
retaliatory harassment claim. “When the workplace is permeated with ‘discriminatory
intimidation, ridicule, and insult’ that is ‘sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter the conditions of
the victim’s employment and create an abusive working environment,’ Title VII is violated.”
Harris v. Forklift Sys., Inc., 510 U.S. 17, 21 (1993) (quoting Meritor Sav. Bank, FSB v. Vinson,
477 U.S. 57, 65, 67 (1986)). To state a harassment claim, a plaintiff must allege that (1) he was
subject to unwelcome harassment, (2) the harassment was based on his protected characteristic,
(3) the harassment was severe or pervasive so as to alter the conditions of employment and create
a hostile or abusive working environment, and (4) a basis exists for employer liability. Huri v.
Off. of the Chief Judge of the Cir. Ct. of Cook Cnty., 804 F.3d 826, 834 (7th Cir. 2015).

Defendants argue that Casselle has not pleaded severe or pervasive harassment.
For purposes of a harassment claim, the “harassment must be sufficiently severe or
pervasive to alter the conditions of employment and create an abusive working environment.”
Ezell v. Potter, 400 F.3d 1041, 1047 (7th Cir. 2005). This includes both subjective and objective
components. Harris, 510 U.S. at 21. To determine whether a workplace is objectively hostile,
the Court considers “the totality of the circumstances, including: ‘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.’” Alamo v. Bliss, 864 F.3d 541, 549–50 (7th Cir. 2017) (quoting Harris, 510 U.S.
at 23).
While Casselle may have subjectively found the conduct at DPI so severe as to create a
hostile or abusive working environment, without more specificity, his allegations do not allow

the inference that a reasonable person would find his work environment hostile, nor do they
suggest how the harassment unreasonably interfered with his work performance. See, e.g.,
Boniface v. Westminster Place, No. 18-CV-4596, 2019 WL 479995, at *3 (N.D. Ill. Feb. 7,
2019) (dismissing the plaintiff’s claim because her allegations were vague and the complaint
contained “no specific allegations suggesting that any conduct was physically threatening or
verbally abusive or how it interfered with her work performance”); Stone v. Bd. of Trs., 38 F.
Supp. 3d 935, 945 (N.D. Ill. 2016) (dismissing the plaintiff’s claim because “there is no factual
allegation which would plausibly suggest either the severity or pervasiveness of the identified
harassment”). While he does complain that toward the end of his employment, Defendants
excluded him from meetings and personnel decisions, he does not tie this to Defendants’

evaluation of his work performance. And to the extent Casselle alleges that Jackson or others
directed verbal attacks at him when he complained about alleged racial incidents, he does not
include any specifics about the contents of these verbal attacks that would suggest the extent of
their harassing nature or whether tied to a protected characteristic. See Cole v. Bd. of Trs., 838
F.3d 888, 896 (7th Cir. 2016) (“Although a connection between the harassment and the
plaintiff’s protected class need not be explicit, ‘there must be some connection, for not every
perceived unfairness in the workplace may be ascribed to discriminatory motivation merely
because the complaining employee belongs to a racial minority.’” (quoting Zayas v. Rockford
Mem’l Hosp., 740 F.3d 1154, 1159 (7th Cir. 2014))).
Casselle’s main allegations of harassment involve the alleged harassment of others, not
harassment directed toward him. For example, he claims that apprentices could not use the
kitchen or refrigerators on the fourth floor and instead had to use the twentieth floor, that Jackson
remarked that apprentices would steal laptops, that a Black woman did not receive a promotion,

and that he stood up for a Black man accused of smoking weed. He also complains that Clarke
and Painter routinely disciplined Black employees and did not treat Black and non-Black
employees the same. The fact that Casselle was not the target of this alleged harassment lessens
its impact. See Smith v. Ne. Ill. Univ., 388 F.3d 559, 567 (7th Cir. 2004) (“While certainly
relevant to the determination of a hostile work environment claim, when harassment is ‘directed
at someone other than the plaintiff, the impact of [such] second-hand harassment is obviously not
as great as the impact of harassment directed at the plaintiff.’” (alteration in original) (citation
omitted) (internal quotation marks omitted)).
Ultimately, Cassell’s allegations are too thin to suggest severe or pervasive harassment.
See McDaniel v. Loyola Univ. Med. Ctr., No. 13-cv-06500, 2014 WL 4269126, at *7 (N.D. Ill.

Aug. 28, 2014) (“Plaintiff’s allegations in the Amended Complaint, while no doubt describing
rude and unpleasant conduct, by themselves do not seem to rise to the level of the hostile and
abusive atmosphere found in the case law.” (collecting cases)); Triplett v. Starbucks Coffee, No.
10 C 5215, 2011 WL 3165576, at *5–7 (N.D. Ill. July 26, 2011) (dismissing hostile work
environment claim despite allegations of a racially insensitive comment, racially based
disciplinary actions, and discrimination against African American employees on multiple
occasions). Therefore, without more, Casselle cannot proceed with his harassment claims at this
time, and the Court dismisses these claims without prejudice.
CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, the Court grants Defendants’ motion to dismiss [10]. The
Court dismisses Casselle’s § 1983 claims (Counts II, IV, V, VI, VIII, and IX) and his Title VII
harassment claims (Counts III and VII) without prejudice. Casselle’s Title VII race
discrimination and retaliatory discharge claims (Counts I and X) against the Board remain
pending.

Dated: March 19, 2026 ( My
SARA L. ELLIS
United States District Judge

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/11317324. Public record. Not legal advice.