where the “in” group acted in a racially derogatory way toward him as a member of the “out” group. The customer’s testimony is relevant because it shows how the Department treated Barber and other members of his race. That the customer was not an employee does not bar her testimony. Finally, we reject the County’s objection to Gary Piehl’s testimony about unresolved grievances that he had presented to the County Board of Supervisors. This testimony is relevant to the County’s defense that Barber failed to exhaust the Department’s grievance procedures. If, as Piehl testified, the Department’s grievance procedures were ineffective, then those procedures cannot bar Barber’s claim of discrimination because it would have been useless for him to exhaust them. Faragher, 524 U.S. at 808-09 (<HOLDING>); Nichols v. Azteca Rest. Enters., Inc., 256
holding that a jail inmate does not have a constitutional entitlement to an adequate grievance procedure and the ineffectiveness or even absence of a grievance procedure does not give rise to a constitutional claim holding that an ineffective grievance procedure bars employers defense based on that procedure holding that because plaintiffs were reasonable in interpreting defendants grievance procedure to apply only to active employees plaintiffs did not act in bad faith when they alleged that no applicable grievance procedure existed holding that a claim based on statements made during a formal grievance procedure was preempted holding that there is no legitimate claim of entitlement to a grievance procedure