United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit

August Term 2022 Submitted: February 27, 2023 Decided: March 15, 2023

No. 22-475

GNANA M. CHINNIAH, AKA GNANACHANDRA M. CHINNIAH, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. FEDERAL ENERGY REGULATORY COMMISSION, JOHN SPAIN, PRAPA HARAN, Defendants-Appellees.

On Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York

Before: CALABRESI, PARK, and NARDINI, Circuit Judges.

Pro se Plaintiff Gnana Chinniah filed a whistleblower claim against his former employer, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and his former supervisors in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. But before doing so, Chinniah failed to exhaust his administrative remedies as required by the Whistleblower Protection Act of 1989 and the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978. The district court (Broderick, J.) thus dismissed the claim for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction. We AFFIRM.

Gnana M. Chinniah, pro se, Camp Hill, PA, for Plaintiff- Appellant.

Alyssa B. O’Gallagher, Benjamin H. Torrance, Assistant United States Attorneys, for Damian Williams, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, New York, NY, for Defendants-Appellees.

PARK, Circuit Judge:

Pro se Plaintiff Gnana Chinniah filed a whistleblower claim against his former employer, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (“FERC”), and his former supervisors in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. But before doing so, Chinniah failed to exhaust his administrative remedies as required by the Whistleblower Protection Act of 1989 (“WPA”) and the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 (“CSRA”). The district court (Broderick, J.) thus dismissed the claim for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction. We affirm.

2 I. BACKGROUND

Chinniah began working as a civil engineer for FERC in New York in January 2017. 1 His supervisor, Defendant Prapa Haran, required employees to sign in and out every day on a sheet in Haran’s office. On July 13, 2017, Chinniah went to sign in around 7:35 am and noticed that a different employee had already “signed in” at 8:30 am. He reported this to Haran, but Haran “never showed any interest to follow up on this incident.” App’x at 23.

Chinniah then reported the incident to Haran’s supervisor, Defendant John Spain. Chinniah alleges that Spain “downplayed” the incident and explained that the employee may have signed in and then “left the office to perform dam safety inspections.” Id. Chinniah insisted on scheduling a meeting to investigate the incident. Spain agreed to hold a meeting, and Chinniah sent an email to confirm the meeting with Spain but also copied other employees on the email. Spain then allegedly “came rushing into” Chinniah’s cubicle and “whispered threats using derogatory language.” Id. at 24. As Spain returned to his office, Chinniah followed him while “asking him to repeat what [he] said or give the same in writing” in a loud voice. Id. at 24–25. Spain then ordered that Chinniah be removed from the building, but Chinniah left voluntarily.

The next week, Chinniah said that he “did not feel fit to return to work” and requested sick leave. Spain informed Chinniah that he had been placed on administrative leave. Two months later, Chinniah was fired.

1 All factual allegations are taken from Chinniah’s Amended Complaint, App’x at 20–33, which we accept as true on a motion