New York Employment Lawyer Blog

The Boathouse Restaurant in Central Park, is under attack for allegedly allowing and participating in discriminatory and improper treatment towards his waiters and dishwashers at Boathouse Restaurant.

Among other complaints, workers argue that they are forced to work double shifts without decent meals and without sufficient work breaks. To protect their rights and to expose this humiliating and demeaning treatment, many Boathouse employees have brought tape recorders to work. These recordings have provided damning evidence that Boathouse has repeatedly violated federal labor laws. On several of the tapes the owner can be heard threatening his employees that if they vote for a union he “will go out of business.”

This statement in connection with restaurant’s recent decision to suddenly dismiss sixteen workers, all of whom are supporters of the union campaign, is significant. The owner claims that he terminated the employment of these workers simply because he has no need for so many workers during the slow season and that outsourcing when necessary is more cost-effective, his recent actions raise questions.

To Read More: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2011/01/28/2011-01-28_restaurant_staffs_tale_of_the_tape.html

Two female employees were recently terminated from their employment at New York’s Standard Hotel's cocktail bar, "Top of the Standard." The women claim they were wrongfully terminated not based on their merits as employees, but rather because they were lacking the height and “willowy physique” of a runway model, which they claim is an unwritten prerequisite for employment at the Top of the Standard, and a means by which the Standard allegedly discriminates along gender lines.

The women were both terminated shortly after receiving performance evaluations that said that their performance had not been “up to par” which was a departure from the positive feedback they had previously received in job performance evaluations. Counsel for the women claims “they were excellent employees who were fired for one reason-their body type.”

The lawyer representing the women says there is a “type” that is employed by the club at the Standard, they are beautiful, tall and skinny, at least the woman are. The lawyer points out the male employees are not hired to based on those physical specifications and therefore there is a difference in the treatment of men and woman when it comes to employment at the Standard.

Although they may have been hired because they were attractive, they were fired because they weren't tall and thin enough. The Top of the Standard decided all the women must look a certain way, but it doesn't matter how the men look. A lawsuit in this matter was recently filed in New York County Supreme Court.

The New York Daily News article can be found here.

Employees who complain about discrimination are protected against retaliation by the company. In Thompson v. North American Stainless, decided on January 24, 2011, the United State Supreme Court addressed what protections third-parties who did not make a complaint have against retaliation.

In Thompson, the male plaintiff and his then-fiancé both worked for the company. The woman filed a charge of sexual harassment in February 2003. Just three weeks later, the man was fired, which he alleged was in punishment for his fiance’s complaint of sexual harassment.

The Supreme Court ruled that the male had a valid claim of retaliation against the company, even though he was not the person who made the complaint of discrimination. The Court, in a decision written by Justice Scalia, held that it was “obvious” that the conduct alleged would violate the laws against retaliation, since the man was “not an accidental victim of the retaliation,” but rather was targeted to punish his fiancé for complaining about discrimination.

The Thompson decision, which reversed the courts below, stands as a remarkable expansion of the protections against retaliation. The Court recommended caution in ensuring that the protections not be extended too far, holding that only persons who are in the “zone of interest” of the statute are protected by that statute.

Last Friday, Rochelle Cohen filed a lawsuit in federal court for the Southern District of New York. The suit claims Ms. Cohen was discriminated against as a result of her age and gender by her former employer, the Bank of New York-Mellon.

The bank claims Ms. Cohen’s position in the Private Wealth group was eliminated despite Ms. Cohen being employed with the Bank for more than ten years and maintaining many significant client relationships.

One of the plaintiff’s claims is that she was unjustly compensated as compared to her male colleagues. Ms. Cohen claims that the male employees were paid more than the female employees for comparable work.

More information is available here.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) recently released statistics showing that with the health of the nation’s economy in decline, and unemployment rates climbing to a staggering 10% of the American population, employment discrimination claims are on the rise. In fact, EEOC has reported that private sector employees have filed a record number of discrimination claims against employers during the fiscal 2010 year, as the number of claims filed rose 7% from 2009 and even more striking, jumped up by 21% from the 2007 fiscal year.

The nature of these claims is also changing. While historically the majority of complaints in employment discrimination claims dealt with racial discrimination, last year the number retaliation claims, involving employees who complained of discrimination and then were adversely impacted, outnumbered claims of racial discrimination.

These findings raise interesting questions as to the correlation of increased lay-offs in a time of economic downfall, and the heightened possibility of employment discrimination, In such a grave working environment, employees must be weary of such discrimination and be mindful of their rights under the law.

More information can be found here.