# Barnett v. District of Columbia Department of Employment Services

> District of Columbia Court of Appeals · May 8, 1985 · 491 A.2d 1156

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9747370

## Case

- **Full name:** Leon BARNETT, Petitioner, v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA DEPARTMENT OF EMPLOYMENT SERVICES, Respondent
- **Court:** District of Columbia Court of Appeals
- **Decided:** May 8, 1985
- **Citations:** 491 A.2d 1156; 1985 D.C. App. LEXIS 386
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by Terry
- **Judges:** MacK, Terry
- **Cited by:** 34 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases.
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9747370

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- noting that resort to technicalities to foreclose recourse to judicial processes is particularly inappropriate, especially in a statutory scheme in which laymen, unassisted by trained lawyers, initiate the process

## Opinion text

TERRY, Associate Judge,
concurring:
I join fully in Judge Mack’s well-wrought opinion. I add these few words merely to emphasize that in ruling as we do in this case, we are not opening the floodgates to careless litigants who sleep on their rights and fail to exhaust their administrative remedies.
The numerous cases which allow the exhaustion requirement to be relaxed all speak in terms of “exceptional,” “extraordinary,” or “compelling” circumstances. I would require a clear showing by the aggrieved litigant that such circumstances not only are present but are totally beyond the litigant’s control. Failing that, the litigant should demonstrate that there would be a “plain miscarriage of justice” 1 if the exhaustion rule were enforced. Because this case meets both of these requirements, I agree with my colleagues that petitioner’s failure to exhaust his administrative remedies should not bar him from access to the courts. I also agree, however, that this is a very unusual case, and thus our willingness to grant relief to this petitioner, in these special circumstances, should not be seen as flinging open the courthouse door to all who might wish to come in. In the vast majority of cases, we will still insist that administrative remedies be exhausted before we grant judicial review.
. Hormel v. Helvering, 312 U.S. 552, 558 , 61 S.Ct. 719, 722 , 85 L.Ed. 1037 (1941).

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9747370. Public record. Not legal advice.