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The Great EEOC Roundup: July Edition


As always, there are some EEOC cases that jump out when I review developments on that front.  Below are a couple EEOC cases and settlements that caught my eye this month.



Pediatrics 2000 (“Pediatrics”) has agreed to settle a religious discrimination claim by paying $68,000.00 after an employee claims the company discriminated against her because of her religion.  The employee was a Jehovah’s Witness, which Pediatrics was aware of when she was hired.  As a Jehovah’s Witness, the employee requested to not work on Wednesday due to her religious practices that day.  While Pediatrics initially was fine with this request, it later demonstrated animus toward her religion by calling it a cult and placed the employee on probation for not reporting to work on Wednesdays.  This conduct is in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which bars employers from discriminating against employees because of their religious beliefs.



Earlier this month, the EEOC filed suit against a Conroe, Texas hospital, The Woodlands Psychiatry and Counseling Company (“Company”), on the grounds that it unlawfully retaliated against an employee that filed a discrimination charge with the EEOC.  The lawsuit alleges that on the same day that an employee filed the discrimination charge and the Company’s owner was notified of the charge, the owner texted the employee and stated “I received your case of discrimination email now,” and told the employee she would be charged with criminal trespass if she returned to the Company’s premises.  Interesting enough, the Company later admitted it terminated the employee because it could not “afford to have a current employee that is in active discrimination charges against the company for liability reasons.”  As readers might be aware, this alleged conduct is in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which prohibits employers from retaliating against employees for complaining about discrimination.



Yesterday, the EEOC announced that UPS Freight had agreed to pay $75,000.00 to settle a disability discrimination claim brought by a former road driver for the company.  According to the lawsuit, Thomas Diebold (“Diebold”) worked as a road driver for the company from 2006 until 2015.  In 2013, after suffering a minor stroke, he sought temporary non-driving work.  However, UPS Freight policy at the time only allowed this reassignment for drivers whose licenses were suspended for non medical reasons.  (The EEOC also challenged a collective bargaining agreement between UPS Freight and the Teamsters.  Under that agreement, drivers with disabilities could be reassigned to non-driving work for medical reasons but were paid 10% less than drivers reassigned for non-medical reasons.  A later ruling held that this agreement violated the Americans with Disabilities Act.)  This $75,000.00 settlement is in regard to the claim brought by Diebold.

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