An unpaid intern cannot sue for sexual harassment under New York state and city laws because she was not paid a salary, a federal court ruled in dismissing hostile work environment charges filed by a former intern at a Chinese-language news production company.

However, the plaintiff in the case can proceed with her failure-to-hire claims, said the ruling by the U.S. District Court in New York in Lehuan Wang v. Phoenix Satellite Television US Inc.

The ruling was issued Oct. 3 but only publicized this week.

Ms. Wang, then a graduate student in journalism at Syracuse University in Syracuse, N.Y., was an unpaid intern in the New York bureau of Phoenix Satellite, a Hong Kong-based media conglomerate that produces television news that maintains its U.S. headquarters in Los Angeles and has another bureau in Washington.

During the time frame that was the focus of the lawsuit, Zhengzhu Liu was the bureau chief of Phoenix's Washington bureau and supervised the Washington and New York City bureaus, according to the ruling.

Ms. Wang interviewed with Mr. Liu for the unpaid internship in the New York bureau and began working there in December 2009. She said she asked Mr. Liu about permanent employment with Phoenix during the first two weeks of her internship, and he told her she could obtain employment for the year after the expiration of her student visa, and perhaps beyond that year if she could obtain a work visa, according to the decision.

%%BREAK%%

In January 2010, during a visit to New York, Mr. Liu lured Ms. Wang to his hotel room, tried to kiss her by force, and squeezed her buttocks, according to the complaint. Ms. Wang left the room.

When she later again asked about a permanent position, he asked her to go to Atlantic City, N.J., for the weekend with him “to discuss job opportunities,” but Ms. Wang declined.

She subsequently filed suit against Phoenix, charging it with subjecting her to a hostile work environment and claims of failure to hire under New York state and city laws.

Judge P. Kevin Castel held that under New York state and city laws, Ms. Wang could not proceed with her hostile work environment claim because she was unpaid.

“It is axiomatic in this circuit that compensation is a threshold issue in determining the existence of an employment relationship under both Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964” and the New York State Human Rights Law.

Nor can Ms. Wang proceed with her claim under the New York City Human Rights law, said the ruling. Unpaid interns “are not employees within the ambit” of that law, said the ruling.

%%BREAK%%

However, she can proceed with her failure-to-hire claims, the court ruled. The complaint “plausibly alleges that Ms. Wang attempted to apply for an unposted vacancy through informal procedures. As such, the complaint is sufficient to sustain a claim” under the state law as well as the New York City law, said the ruling.

Phoenix terminated Mr. Liu in December 2012 after an investigation into an event unrelated to the case, and the company was unaware of Ms. Wang’s allegations at the time of the investigation, according to Phoenix attorney M. Carter DeLorme, a partner with Jones Day in Washington.

Mr. DeLorme said in an interview that while the court said it was plausible to infer Ms. Wang had been applying for a position, “we’re not aware she was applying for a position,” and the company has not hired a full-time reporter since she was an intern.

It “certainly did not allow” discrimination to take place with respect to Ms. Wang and it will become apparent the company did nothing wrong during discovery, Mr. DeLorme said.