New York Employment Lawyer Blog

Sports Illustrated reports on June 12 that a former employee of NASCAR has filed a $225 million lawsuit against NASCAR, citing sexual, racial, and gender discrimination.

The plaintiff, a former Nationwide Series inspector, alleges atrocious behavior from her co-workers, alleging that they called her a “Nappy-Headed Ho,” made repeated references to the Ku Klux Klan, and stating that two went as far as exposing themselves to her. NASCAR has suspended the two accused employees without explanation.

The plaintiff called NASCAR an “old boys club” and went to great lengths in describing the insular nature of the company. “They need to stop hiring ignorant sisters, cousins and uncles [of theirs] and start hiring qualified, educated people to work their billion-dollar business,” she said in an interview.

NASCAR has responded, saying that the plaintiff never filed a complaint, and therefore could not blame NASCAR for not being able to stop the behavior. The CEO of NASCAR said that he had not been aware of the situation and the claims would be immediately investigated.

The fact is, racial, sexual, and gender discrimination is never to be tolerated. If you feel as if you have been subject to any of these types of unfair treatment, please feel free to contact us for an initial consultation without charge at which time we would be pleased to discuss your issue.

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Posted In: Employment Discrimination , Gender discrimination , Racial Discrimination , Sexual Harassment

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The 2008 presidential election is extraordinary in many respects. It marks the first time that an African-American, overcoming racial discrimination, has secured the nomination of a major party. It also has had a woman, in spite of an unfair gender bias, advance far beyond anyone’s initial predictions. In addition to these two stereotypes, the New York Sun reported on June 18th about another issue that has permeated the race: the issue of age.

The Republican contender, John McCain, and Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic nominee, have begun to exchange barbs over the John McCain’s age. The McCain camp alludes to the fact that Obama may be too young, calling him inexperienced. In return, the Obama campaign has suggested that Mr. McCain may be “confused,” or “has lost his bearings.”

Schwartz & Perry’s Managing Partner, Murray Schwartz, commented on the issue in the June 18th edition of the New York Sun, stating “Age discrimination is an insidious, egregious disease. Age should not be a factor in any employment decision that’s made,” he continued. “Not in hiring. Not in firing.”

Mr. Schwartz, while refraining from making any political observations, continued, saying “If someone is going to be ignored as a viable candidate because of age, besides it violating the law, it would be shameful. Experience is a major component of everything.”

Schwartz & Perry specializes in age discrimination suits. If you feel that you have been treated in an unjust manner as a result of your age, please feel free to contact us for a free consultation.

The text of the article can be found at the following link: http://www.nysun.com/opinion/john-lalanne-mccain/80217/.

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Posted In: Age Discrimination , Employment Discrimination , Gender discrimination , Racial Discrimination

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Over the past several months, we have discussed several significant issues in the field of employment discrimination. We have touched upon everything from evidence in discrimination cases to recent verdicts and decisions to emerging trends and ideas in the field.

But, perhaps, the most significant item that had been discussed were the recent statistics regarding claims filed by employees in the workplace. This means that employees are further realizing and becoming aware of the rights they have against discrimination in all its forms. This is particularly gratifying.

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Posted In: Age Discrimination , Employment Discrimination , Employment Law , Evidence , Gender discrimination , Pregnancy Discrimination , Racial Discrimination , Retaliation , Sexual Harassment , Sexual Orientation Discrimination

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It was not easy to read an article that appeared in the New York Times on May 10, 2008, which related to the transmittal of emails circulated to and from email accounts of at least twenty secret service supervisors.

Although the agency’s position is that they deplore racially insensitive jokes and express disappointment that they were transmitted, the fact is they appear to have been sent and the disappointment that we all feel at learning such information is indeed troubling.

The ease with which written documents are transmitted through email has resulted in loose and thoughtless material being transmitted that has no place in rational and thoughtful communication. The abuse has reached proportions so vast that there is hardly any litigation in which among the significant exhibits are emails that either or both of the parties foolishly transmitted. If we could point to one specific area that requires greater thought and unfortunately, in some instances, more detailed supervision, it would be with the freedom with which emails are transmitted. There is hardly a case tried in a court where emails do not have a material and significant effect.

If we can offer a suggestion with respect to the destructive manner in which emails are so readily exchanged it would be to think seriously about what is being written before your message turns around to haunt you.

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Posted In: Employment Discrimination , Evidence , Racial Discrimination

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In a recent article in the National Law Journal from May 5, 2008, the results of a recent survey revealed differences in the amount of post-law school debt among gender and races.

The survey put forth data stating that women generally are in greater debt than men and minorities are likely to have a larger debt than Caucasian law graduates. One can come to their own individual conclusions regarding this data, but perhaps disparities in hiring after law school among genders and races may force some students to carry this debt longer and not be able to pay it back sooner or that even among those who attain gainful employment shortly after graduating, still suffer the effects of a glass ceiling in the salaries they are able to earn.

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Posted In: Employment Law , Gender discrimination , Racial Discrimination

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On April 1, 2008, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled for the first time that an employer can be held liable for race discrimination based on an employee’s association with a person of another race. The court reversed the District Court’s decision to grant Defendant Iona College’s motion for summary judgment, rejecting the District Court’s restrictive view of Title VII race claims as applying only to an individual “because of such individual’s race.” Instead, the court found that where the Plaintiff-employee, Craig Holcomb, a white man, was allegedly terminated and discriminated against because of his marriage to an African-American woman, “the employee suffers discrimination because of the employee’s own race.”

Plaintiff, an assistant basketball coach at Iona College, alleged that he was terminated based on his supervisors’ discriminatory animus against his interracial marriage. The court found that the plaintiff had adduced enough evidence, through the comments and conduct of his supervisors, to show that his termination was based, at least in part, on improper racial motives. The Court noted that even though Iona College had proffered valid reasons for Holcomb’s termination, namely the poor performance of Iona’s basketball team, the employee need only show that “the prohibited factor was at least one of the ‘motivating’ factors” in his termination.

This ruling may also open the door to other claims of discrimination based on association, such as religious discrimination based on an employees association with a person of another religion.

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Posted In: Employment Discrimination , Racial Discrimination

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In the case of Hubbard v. Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, 2008 WL 464694 (S.D.N.Y. Feb. 20, 2008), currently pending in the Southern District of New York, the plaintiffs alleged, among other things, that they were subjected to a hostile environment because they were African-American. The plaintiffs recounted a two-year period where they were given demeaning tasks, while their white co-workers were not, and where their co-workers posted pictures of a blurry black woman and a picture of two monkeys, referring to the plaintiffs.

The defendant moved to dismiss the plaintiff’s hostile environment claim, in a motion for summary judgment, claiming that not all of the acts could be considered “discrimination,” since they did not reference the plaintiffs’ race. The court denied the defendant’s motion holding that “[w]hile not every allegation bespeaks of overt racial animus,” sufficient evidence existed for a jury to find that the acts were motivated by race.

The court’s decision in Hubbard reaffirms that merely because particular conduct may not directly reference race, it still may be motivated by race, and serve as the basis for a claim. Instead, courts will look to “the totality of the circumstances” to determine if conduct is based on race, even where conduct itself does not implicate race.

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Posted In: Employment Discrimination , Racial Discrimination

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On March 6, 2008, an article appeared in the New York Times, reflecting the increase in complaints of discrimination in the workplace. The article went on to state that, “federal job discrimination complaints by workers against private employers rose by 9% last year, the biggest annual increase since the early 1990s.” According to the statistics, this was the most filed since 2002.

Based on the article, one might reasonably conclude that job discrimination has intensified. Another reasonable conclusion might also be that more individuals who suffer discrimination in the workplace have been able to observe, from their experiences, that those who complain of discrimination do not suffer the results of reporting discrimination to the same extent they did previously. They have had an opportunity to witness friends and colleagues in the workplace who have reported discrimination but somehow did not suffer the results of discrimination for reporting what they recognized was a violation of their human rights.

There is a reasonable likelihood to believe that it is not necessarily the increase in discriminatory conduct that caused the number of individuals who report discrimination to be greater than before. Instead it will be that they have learned that reporting discrimination does not necessarily produce retaliation. The strong retaliation laws that our lawmakers have enacted throughout our country have, in large part, effectively protected those who report discrimination from the retaliatory conduct they feared in the past. This is certainly a hopeful result.

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Posted In: Age Discrimination , Employment Discrimination , Employment Law , Gender discrimination , Racial Discrimination , Retaliation , Sexual Harassment , Sexual Orientation Discrimination

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A New York City Police Officer, who is Muslim, has prevailed in a Motion for Summary Judgment in his race discrimination suit under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and 42 U.S.C. §1981. The officer claims that a counter-terrorism advisor to the New York Police Department, created a hostile work environment by subjecting him to discriminatory remarks and constantly forwarding emails degrading Muslims to the plaintiff and other NYPD personnel.

The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York dismissed the defendant's argument that his comments and emails were “free speech” that should be protected by the First Amendment because “acts are not shielded from regulation merely because they express a discriminatory idea or philosophy.”

The Court’s ruling elucidates that race discrimination in the workplace is not constitutionally protected free speech. The case is John Doe Anti-Terrorism Officer v. The City of New York, 06-CV-13738.

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Posted In: Employment Discrimination , Racial Discrimination

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The City of New York has agreed to settle a class-action race discrimination lawsuit against its Parks Department. The case involved a claim that the Parks Department had a pattern and practice of paying minorities significantly less than their white counterparts, and creating an environment which was rife with racially charged derogatory remarks. The plaintiffs’ also alleged that complaints would go unanswered and retaliation for making a complaint was the norm.

In this case, according to the 2/27/08 New York Times article by Diane Cardwell, the data showed that over 90% of those Parks Department employees who were earning less that $20,000 per year were either African-American or Hispanic, whereas only 14.2% of those earning between $50,000 and $60,000 were either African-American or Hispanic. This disparity is significant in that it demonstrates a pattern and practice of discriminatory conduct over a period of time.

It is important to note that discrimination need not be proven with a smoking gun, but one form of evidence that a plaintiff may use in a discrimination case is that of statistical evidence, which is apparent in the Parks Department case.

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Posted In: Employment Discrimination , Evidence , Racial Discrimination

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Labor and employment issues, particularly in the context of the protection of federal anti-discrimination laws, are one of the significant subjects to be addressed on the Supreme Court’s docket during this current term. The Court will hear arguments from both employees and employers on issues ranging from age discrimination (ADEA) and disability (ADA) protection to EEOC filing issues to a case relating to retaliation under the federal civil rights statutes. This was originally discussed in the Outside Counsel column of the February 13, 2008, issue of the New York Law Journal written by Robert P. Lewis, which referred to the Supreme Court’s employment law docket this term.

Among some of cases that the Court will decide will be whether the ADEA’s protections against retaliation by one’s employer can be extended to federal employees. Another case poses the question of whether the ADEA’s requirement of filing a “charge” of discrimination is met by the filing by the employee with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission of an intake questionnaire and accompanying affidavit. The Federal Civil Rights statutes will also be an area of focus for the Court. The statute at issue, 42 U.S.C. § 1981, does not contain the words “retaliation” or “retaliatory,” yet the question presented is whether a cause of action for race retaliation can be brought under the statute.

It is evident that the Supreme Court will be spending a great deal of its time grappling with the complex issues of labor and employment law. The employment field is ever expanding and presents some of the most cutting-edge and developing legal issues of the day. It is apparent that due to the complex and rapid developments in employment law, it is essential that should you believe you might need counsel in your employment situation, it is imperative that you contact an experienced professional in the field. The practice of our firm is devoted to employment law in all of its many facets. You have only to reach out for us and we would be delighted to speak with you. There is no fee for this initial consultation, during which time we would discuss the issues you may have. If you wish to browse our website, we would be delighted to have you do so.

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Posted In: Age Discrimination , Employment Discrimination , Racial Discrimination , Retaliation

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A former New York State Senate photographer, Joseph Maioriello, who is Caucasian, has prevailed in a Motion for Summary Judgment in his race discrimination suit under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. The photographer claimed that he was terminated by then Minority Leader David Paterson due to his race and replaced by an African-American employee.

The photographer claimed that he had performed capably in the State Legislature for twenty-six years and claims that he was fired because some of the legislators that worked with Maioriello wanted a minority employee in his position. The Defendants claim that his termination was a function of both poor performance and that he was a holdover from a past political leader and there would be questions of loyalty to the new Senate leadership.

A Motion for Summary Judgment is a dispositive motion. Defendants will make this type of motion and argue that there are no issues of fact for a jury to resolve and on those grounds, the case should be dismissed. The plaintiff, in these cases, must raise issues of fact and demonstrate that the issues of the case are best resolved by the court allowing them to make their case to a jury and having them decide. The jury would then determine if there was, in fact, discrimination in the employment decision or whether the non-discriminatory reasons offered by the employer are believable.

In this case, Judge Mordue of the Federal District Court of the Northern District of New York found there to be triable issues of fact in this case and it would be best for a jury to hear the cases presented by both sides and then make a determination at that point. The case is Maioriello v. New York State Senate Minority, et al, 1:05-XV-1062 (decided 2/12/08).

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Posted In: Employment Discrimination , Racial Discrimination

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It was heartening to read in the January 3, 2008 edition of the Wall Street Journal, that Lockheed Martin Corp. settled a race discrimination claim for 2.5 million dollars. The article went on to state that this was the largest individual race discrimination payment obtained by the EEOC. The fact that this settlement was reported at the start of a new year, perhaps might provide us with a prediction of things still to come.

It is clear to all of us practicing in the field of employee rights, that the strength and persistence of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) can be a strong factor in providing a message to employers. In fact, it is believed by some that the EEOC is particularly interested in moving forward with high visibility matters because it helps send a message to the workplace that the EEOC is there to provide some measure of control over what would otherwise be a workplace that has minimal policing. The more visible the company involved, the more visible is the message. In this case, the settlement was said to be one of the largest individual race discrimination settlements obtained by the EEOC.

The article reflected figures provided by EEOC officials, which stated that race discrimination complaints reached 7,000 in FY 2007, up from 3,268 in FY 1990. The EEOC was said to have launched a strong effort to broaden education and intensify enforcement against race discrimination in the workplace. The fact is, discrimination in the workplace, in all its many forms, should become the subject of greater effort and stronger surveillance not only by the EEOC, but from individuals who are afflicted with discriminatory workplaces and fail to act upon it. The rallying cry should not simply be emanating from our EEOC, but from all of those individuals who suffer from the curse of discrimination. Just as the EEOC is available, so are the courts who have been provided with laws by the federal government, by many state governments, and in some cases, even local laws such as the City law, which is available in New York.

If you believe you have been discriminated against because of your age, race, gender, disability, or any other form of discrimination, seek help from an attorney practicing in the field of employment law. We would be pleased to offer that assistance should you desire.

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This month, a federal racial discrimination case filed by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) against the retailer Target Corp. in Wisconsin concluded with settlement of $510,000 and additional terms.

The EEOC’s suit claimed that in 2000 and 2001,Target improperly denied management jobs to four African-American applicants -three who were not interviewed, and one who had interviewed but did not get the job, despite his testing well on Target’s own leadership ability test. The EEOC also claimed that Target failed to make and preserve records relevant to the determination of whether Target had engaged in unlawful employment practices.

The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin granted Target’s motion for summary judgment. On appeal, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in 2006 reversed and remanded, finding in its opinion that, although Target revised its record keeping policy, nothing in Target’s new policy clearly prevented bad faith destruction of resumes or other employment application documents. The Court of Appeals also found that, with regard to Target’s decision not to hire the applicant who took the leadership test based on his qualifications, Target presented “an ostensibly objective nondiscriminatory reason but failed to articulate what criteria informed this reason.”

With regard to the other three applicants, the court found that “the EEOC did present sufficient evidence to establish a genuine issue of material fact as to whether Target’s reason for not interviewing [the three applicants] was a pretext for race discrimination,” noting that although Target argued that its hiring manager could not have discriminated against the three applicants because he did not know their race, the EEOC presented evidence that created a genuine issue of material fact as to whether the manager indeed knew the applicants’ race. In a press release, the director of the EEOC’s Chicago District Office said that the appeals court decision was “noteworthy for its ruling that the trial court could admit into evidence expert testimony to the effect that the employer may have racially identified the applicants as African American on the basis of their names or accents heard during telephone conversations.”

Following the U.S. Court of Appeals reversal, the EEOC and Target settled the suit by way of a consent decree. According to the EEOC release, under the 30-month consent decree, Target agreed to pay a total of $510,000 to the four applicants and to revise its document retention policies, provide training to supervisors on employment discrimination and record-keeping; report on hiring decisions, and post a notice about the decree to employees in its District 110 stores and offices.

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Posted In: Racial Discrimination

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