Articles Posted in Race Discrimination

A Connecticut appeals court recently ruled that an ambulance company could legally discriminate against a volunteer on the basis of her race. The volunteer who brought the case, an African American woman named Sarah Puryear, alleged that her ambulance company discriminated against her because of her race.  Ms. Puryear alleged, among other things, that she “was subject to verbal harassment and an abusive working environment,” which included “inappropriate comments about the ‘ghetto’ and Africa.” The ambulance company argued that Connecticut’s discrimination law does not protect volunteers from discrimination because they are not employees. Thus, the ambulance company argued, even if it did discriminate against Puryear because of her race, it did not violate the law.

The court agreed with the ambulance company’s argument and adopted a legal test for determining whether a worker is an employee entitled to protections from discrimination. This legal test, called the “remuneration test,” requires a worker to show that she received some financial benefit from the employer for the work that she performed before she is entitled to protection from discrimination.

The court borrowed the remuneration test from federal case law that interprets Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. Nina Pirrotti, President of the Connecticut Employment Lawyers Association, disagreed with this decision. Ms. Pirrotti did not represent either party in the case. But she said that, if she had represented Ms. Puryear, she would have argued that Connecticut’s anti-discrimination law is more protective than federal law and, as such, the court should not have adopted the remuneration test from federal case law. She said that Connecticut courts have refused in the past to adopt standards from federal law when they interpret Connecticut’s anti-discrimination law, such as in Vollemans v. Town of Wallingford.

Tatsha Robertson, a former Senior Editor for People magazine, has sued People and its parent company, Time, Inc., for race discrimination.  Robertson, who is African American, alleges that People Magazine laid her off because of her race.

According to Robertson’s lawsuit, “behind the cover and pages of People magazine, is a discriminatory organization run entirely by white people who intentionally focus the magazine on stories involving White people and White celebrities.”  The lawsuit goes on to cite examples of stories that People decided not to publish because they did not concern “white middle class suburbia.”  According to the lawsuit, Robertson was the only African American Senior Editor, among eight Senior Editors, at People and the only African American to ever serve in that position in the history of People magazine.  Moreover, she alleges that there were no African Americans in leadership positions above her at People.

Robertson, an award winning editor, began to work for Time at another one of its magazines, Essence.  While Robertson worked at Essence, according to the lawsuit, Essence published multiple stories related to President Obama and First Lady Obama as well as other presidential candidates during the 2008 presidential campaign.  Before this, according to the lawsuit, People had always been recognized for its coverage of the White House and, for that reason, in 2009, Time’s Human Resources department recruited Robertson to move from Essence to People.

The U.S. First Circuit Court of Appeals has held that the Boston Police Department may have violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act because it used a drug test that analyzed hair samples which had a disparate impact on African American police officers.  After looking at the statistical differences between the rates at which the drug tests yielded positive results for African American and white police officers over an eight-year period, the court was “almost certain that the difference in outcomes associated with race over that period cannot be attributed to chance alone.”

Experts for the African American officers who brought the case believe that these differences in drug test results occurred, in part, because African Americans’ hair differs from white people’s hair.  These experts testified that African Americans tend to have higher levels of melanin in their hair which causes cocaine and associated chemicals to bind to their hair at a higher rate.  Cocaine and associated chemicals binds to hair when cocaine powder is in the air or when the person has undergone certain cosmetic hair treatments which are more common in the African American community.  These experts also testified that hair tests are relatively unreliable.  In fact, the federal government has refused to authorize hair tests in the screening of federal employees and employees of private industries for which the federal government regulates their drug testing.

Now that the First Circuit has determined that this hair sample drug test had a disparate impact on African Americans, the Boston Police Department, and related defendants, must prove that the drug test is “predictive of or significantly correlated with” drug use.  If they cannot prove that their drug test sufficiently predicts drug use, they will be liable for violating Title VII.  If they can prove that their drug test sufficiently predicts drug use, the African American police officers could still prevail if they can show that there is an alternative drug test that also predicts drug use but that does not have as large of a disparate impact on African Americans as the hair test.

Bed Bath & Beyond has agreed to a settlement with New York’s Attorney General regarding the company’s policy of refusing to hire all applicants with past criminal convictions.  In New York, with the exception of law enforcement jobs, it is illegal for employers to categorically refuse to hire all applicants with criminal convictions.  Instead, New York law requires employers to individually consider applicants with criminal convictions before they may refuse to hire them based on their conviction.  In making their decision, employers must consider factors such as the specific duties associated with the job, how long ago the applicant was convicted of the crime, and the seriousness of the crime.  Applicants with a 20 year old conviction for marijuana possession, for instance, should not be treated the same as someone who was just released from prison for attempted murder.

“This agreement puts employers on notice that slamming the door on job seekers based on past conduct without deciding whether that conduct is relevant to the current job is not only wrong -– it’s unlawful,” said New York’s Attorney General, Eric Schneiderman.

“Excluding anyone with a criminal history from employment undermines public safety,” said Madeline Neighly of the National Employment Law Project, an organization that advocates for workers’ rights. “Employment is key to reducing recidivism and strengthening families and community involvement.”