The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has recently filed a lawsuit against a property management company in which the EEOC alleges that the company revoked a job offer that it had made to an applicant after the company learned that the prospective employee suffered from a disability.  The EEOC's lawsuit claims that the company made a job offer to the employee to work as an administrative employee, but then learned that the employee had subsequently been diagnosed with a common form of breast cancer.  The prospective employee's doctor confirmed that she could still perform the job, but she would need limited time off of work each week for treatment.  Instead of discussing this request for a reasonable accommodation with the employee, the company withdrew her job offer.  This alleged conduct is a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act.  The ADA prohibits employers from discriminating against employees, including those who have not yet started working, due to a disability or a reasonable request for an accommodation related to a disability.  See Case No. 1:24-cv-10370 (D. Mass.)

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission recently settled a lawsuit against a manufacturing and distribution company, J&M Industries, in which the EEOC had alleged that J&M discriminated against one of its employees due to their age.  The EEOC's lawsuit claimed that J&M terminated the employee because she refused to retire after she turned 65 years old.  As her 65th birthday neared, a manager repeatedly asked her about retirement.  In response, the employee told the manager that she had no plans to retire.  After learning this, the company terminated her employment under the pretense that her position was being eliminated for economic reasons.  Less than a month later, however, J&M hired an employee in his thirties for the very same position it had claimed to eliminate.  This alleged conduct is a violation of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, which prohibits discrimination against employees over the age of 40 due to their age.  See EEOC v. J&M Industries, Inc., Civil Action No. 2:23-cv-01100 (E.D. La.).

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has settled a lawsuit alleging that a workplace facility management company, ISS Facility Services, refused to grant reasonable accommodations to one of its employees who suffered from a disability.  The EEOC’s lawsuit alleged that, for months, ISS required its employees to work remotely four days per week due to COVID.  After that requirement ended, the employee in the EEOC's lawsuit asked for ISS to permit her to work from home for two days per week and to allow her additional breaks while at work.  Despite permitting other employees in the same job as her to work from home, ISS refused her requested reasonable accommodations.  Such alleged conduct is a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act, as amended, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of an employee’s disability or requests for accommodations due to a disability. See EEOC v. ISS Facility Services, Inc., Case No. 1:21-cv-03708-SCJ-RDC (N.D. Ga.).

The U.S. Department of Labor recently announced that it reached an agreement with Krispy Kreme after a DOL investigation found that Krispy Kreme had denied time-and-a-half overtime wages to over 500 employees throughout the nation.  The DOL's investigation began with a single store, before it expanded when the DOL determined that the overtime violations were systemic.  The DOL found that Krispy Kreme had failed to include monthly bonuses in the regular rate of pay for some of its employees, which denied them certain time-and-a-half overtime wages to which they were entitled.  Many employees who receive bonuses must have these bonuses included for overtime calculation purposes, and a failure to do so may be a Fair Labor Standards Act violation.
​See https://www.dol.gov/newsroom/releases/whd/whd20221117 

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission settled a lawsuit alleging retaliation against Keystone Foods LLC, in which the EEOC alleged that Keystone retracted a job offer after it learned that the applicant had previously filed a Charge of Discrimination against it.  The EEOC's lawsuit claimed that, during a job fair, Keystone offered jobs to seventeen applicants who previously worked for them.  Keystone offered the employee in this lawsuit a job the same day as the job fair, and the applicant accepted the job offer on the spot.  After making the offer and it being accepted, however, Keystone learned that this employee had previously complained about pregnancy discrimination at Keystone and filed an EEOC Charge of pregnancy discrimination against the company.  Upon realizing this, Keystone immediately retracted the job offer.  This alleged conduct is a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits retaliation for complaints of discrimination and the filing of Charges of Discrimination with the EEOC.  See EEOC v. Keystone Foods LLC, Case No. 2:21-cv-00629-MHT-JTA (M.D. Ala.).

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission reached a settlement agreement with a company to resolve a charge of discrimination in which the employee had claimed that the company discriminated against him because of his sexual orientation.  The employee alleged that Resource Environment Services subjected him to a hostile work environment and then refused to return him to work because of his sexual orientation.  This alleged conduct is a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits employers from discriminating against employees due to their sexual orientation.  The U.S. Supreme Court recently recognized sexual orientation discrimination as a protected class pursuant to Title VII.  The EEOC and the employer reached a settlement agreement through the EEOC's conciliation process.  See https://www.eeoc.gov/newsroom/eeoc-and-resourceful-environmental-services-agree-conciliate-sexual-orientation-charge.

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission recently sued a home health care company for terminating an employee because of her pregnancy and a disability.  The EEOC's lawsuit claims that Heartfelt Home Healthcare Services, Inc. terminated one of its scheduling coordinators because she was pregnant and because she suffered from hypertension.  The lawsuit further alleges that the president and vice president told her that she was a "liability to the company" on numerous occasions, and that they terminated her employment after she was treated at the hospital for early contractions.  The termination occurred even though the employee did not have medical restrictions that prevented her from performing her job.  This alleged conduct is a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended by the Pregnancy Discrimination Act.  Discrimination against an employee because of their sex or because of their pregnancy is illegal.  See U.S. EEOC v. Heartfelt Home Healthcare Services, Inc., Civil Action No. 1:22-cv-00280-CB (W.D. Pa.). 

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission recently filed a lawsuit against Sinclair Broadcast Group, alleging that the company had discriminated against an employee because of her race.  The EEOC's lawsuit claimed that Sinclair had paid this employee, who is African American, less than it paid to employees who were not African American and that Sinclair also treated employees of other races more favorably than it treated this employee.  The lawsuit further alleges that the employee reported the discriminatory wage practice and that Sinclair refused to do anything to address the complaint, resulting in the employee being forced to resign.  This alleged conduct is a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits discrimination based on race, including pay disparities based on race.  See EEOC v. Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc., Case No. 1:22-cv-02477 (D. Md.).

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has recently filed a lawsuit against Wal-Mart, alleging that Wal-Mart failed to provide a reasonable accommodation to one of its sales associates and then placed that employee on an indefinite unpaid leave.  The EEOC’s lawsuit claimed that Wal-Mart initially allowed the employee the accommodation of using an electric cart to assist with his job duties, such as stocking shelves.  The employee needed this accommodation due to his disability.  Arbitrarily, after about seven months of permitting the use of the scooter, a new manager told the employee that he could no longer use it.  Wal-mart told the employee that the store’s carts were only for customers, despite permitting its use for months, and informed the employee that he would need to either buy his own electric cart or transfer to the self-checkout host position.  The employee was not physically capable of performing work in the self-checkout position, and he was not able to purchase an electric cart, so Wal-mart sent the employee home on an indefinite leave with no pay.  This alleged conduct is a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act, as amended, which requires employers to provide reasonable accommodations to disabled employees.  See Equal Employment Opportunity Commission v. Wal-Mart Stores East, LP, Civil Action No.: 1:22-cv-02596 (D.S.C.).

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission recently settled a lawsuit against a headhunting company, Jivaro Professional Headhunters.  The EEOC's lawsuit claims that the company discriminated against one of its employees, who worked for Jivaro as a senior technical engineer, and then later retaliated against her.  The lawsuit alleged that the employee was hospitalized and fired because of that hospitalization.  In addition, after she filed her EEOC charge, the company retaliated against her by giving prospective employers misleading and negative job reviews and further retaliated by filing a lawsuit against her, because she filed a Charge of Discrimination with the EEOC.  Such actions are prohibited by the Americans with Disabilities Act, as amended, which prohibits discrimination against an employee due to their disability and which further prohibits retaliation for complaints, including the filing of an EEOC charge, of disability discrimination.  See EEOC v. Jivaro Professional Headhunters, LLC, Case No. 1:20-cv-00461-CWD (D. Idaho).

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission recently settled a lawsuit that it had filed against a company doing business as Subway 701.  The EEOC had alleged that Subway 701 hired an employee with autism and ADHD who requested reasonable accommodations due to his disabilities.  The requested accommodations included specific instructions for tasks and for somebody to check and make sure he understood the tasks.  Rather than provide these accommodations, however, the EEOC's lawsuit claimed that the company refused to grant the accommodations and then fired the employee after only four shifts because of his disabilities and his accommodation requests.  These alleged actions violate the Americans with Disabilities Act, as amended, which mandates that employees provide reasonable accommodations to disabled employees.  See EEOC v. RCC Partners, LLC d/b/a Subway 701, Case No. 2:21-cv-01551 (D. Ariz.).