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A number of former female employees of sportswear powerhouse Nike are alleging in a gender discrimination lawsuit they were systematically maligned and denied key professional opportunities simply because of their gender.gender discrimination attorney

The gender discrimination lawsuit, filed in a federal court in Oregon, alleges the maker of sports apparel willfully and intentionally discriminated against female employees with respect to their wages, promotions and other conditions of employment, causing and fostering a work environment that was hostile. The women are seeking class action status, with the two primary claimants having previously worked at the company’s headquarters in Oregon. One now works for the firm’s primary rival. The women say females at the firm were judged significantly more harshly than their male counterparts, which in turn resulted in lower wages, reduced stock options and less in bonuses. When they reported the disparate treatment to human resources, their allegations (including those involving sexual assault and harassment) were mishandled or else blatantly ignored.

In a written statement, the company insisted they vehemently oppose any form of discrimination and that its pay and benefits for workers and that the “vast majority” of its workers live by values that include respect for all others. Earlier this year, a group of women at the company presented the CEO and president with information gleaned in an internal gender discrimination survey. The CEO swiftly responded with a full restructure of the team, which included announcing the president would soon be retiring. The president was largely blamed by plaintiffs for not only creating but exacerbating gender discrimination on the job. He was reportedly being groomed to take over as CEO until all this came to light. Continue Reading ›

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A construction worker in Oregon has filed an employment lawsuit alleging religious discrimination and retaliation after he was fired for refusing to attend a mandatory weekly Christian Bible study.religious discrimination

The 34-year-old Native American said he expressed to his boss/ the business owner discomfort about going to the Bible study and even indicated it was probably illegal, but was told it was a condition of employment for which he would be paid. Although he still wasn’t comfortable with it, as a convicted felony, he badly needed the job and didn’t want to lose it. So he attended the once-weekly hour-long session, conducted by a Christian pastor. He did this for several months, but then finally said he could no longer stomach it and stopped going. He was fired soon thereafter.

In filing his religious discrimination employment lawsuit, plaintiff’s attorney said the case is clear-cut: A non-religious employer can’t require employees to go to a Bible study – paid or otherwise. It can be offered as a voluntary option, but it can’t be mandated as a condition of employment and employers can’t retaliate against workers who choose not to go. The attorney representing defendant business owner, meanwhile, asserts the requirement was not unlawful for at-will employees who were paid to go and it was considered part of their job. Further, defense attorney insists plaintiff wasn’t fired, but rather was an on-call employee who simply found other work while he was still on-call for the defendant.  Continue Reading ›

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Even as the issue of maternity leave for birth mothers is yet largely unsettled at many workplaces, questions pertaining to the rights of fathers, LGBTQ couples and adoptive parents has been largely left open.FMLA attorney

Of course, the federal Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 makes it clear that new parents are entitled to at least 12 weeks of unpaid leave, and this applies to fathers as well as mothers and adoptive parents. However, few families can afford for even one parent to take that amount of unpaid time off work. Many workplaces will offer birth mothers paid leave, but the question is whether it’s lawful to offer disparate levels of leave to other classifications of new parents.

A case recently taken on by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is the first such federal regulator lawsuit targeting parental leave policies granting more time to new mothers than new fathers. The settlement marks a shift in how both regulators and corporations are likely to respond to such policies.  Continue Reading ›

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California is one of the few states that prohibits transgender discrimination in housing and employment. Cal. Gov’t. Code Section 12940(a) stipulates it’s unlawful for an employer to refuse to hire or employ someone or to discharge from employment or to discriminate against a person in compensation or in terms, conditions or privileges because of one’s gender identity. transgender discrimination

However, many other states lack such protections, and now, one transgender discrimination in employment case out of Michigan could go before the U.S. Supreme Court, potentially making it lawful for workplaces around the country to take adverse employment actions against workers on the basis of their sexual identity.

As reported by Lawrence-Journal World, the Kansas Attorney General is joining with officials from 15 other states, asking the U.S. Supreme Court to expressly declare transgender workers not protected by federal workplace anti-discrimination laws. In particular, they are requesting the U.S. Supreme Court reverse a ruling by the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Michigan, which decided the word “sex” used in the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964 – particularly in Title VII – does include transgender status and gender identity.  Continue Reading ›

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Two former full-time instructors providing services for the General Assembly while employed by a New York-based contractor say they were wrongly classified as independent contractors. The instructors, hired to teach both part-time and full-time courses in fields of technology, business and design, say they were wrongly denied overtime pay, rest breaks and meal breaks – despite working up to 16 hours daily to prepare lessons, grade assignments, meet with students and attend marketing events. As reported by EdSurge, the instructors say they were paid a flat fee, despite working 80 hours each week. In violation of California Labor Code, the instructors allege the company failed to document how many hours they worked and pay them overtime wages accordingly. They represent more than 1,200 current and former instructors who reportedly taught for the firm from 2013 through this year. appleonthedesk-300x225

In March, the judge proposed – and both parties agreed – to a $1 million settlement, which was signed in July and is now awaiting approval from the judge. After administrative and legal fees, there will be about $590,000 to split among the more than 1,200 instructors.

The case is unique for the fact that while we tend to think of the growing “gig” economy as being the primary source of a growing number of California employee misclassification lawsuits, many fields have employed independent contractors and allegedly failed to pay them.  Continue Reading ›

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A high-profile federal lawsuit alleges Harvard discrimination against Asian Americans students may allow an opening for a conservative-leaning U.S. Supreme Court to strike down affirmative action. The legal strategist who filed the lawsuit on behalf of those students oversees a group that is expressly anti-affirmative action. On behalf of the students, he asserts the Ivy League schools discriminate against Asian American students by capping the number of admissions of these students (which may include those who are Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander).racial discrimination

Proponents of affirmative action policies say race-conscious admission and hiring is necessary for all students of color – including Asian Americans – in order to fight back against long-held inequality in higher education and the job market.

Plaintiffs are alleging that the so-called “model minority myth,” which holds Asian Americans to be overwhelmingly successful, both in academics and professionally, is harming them in this instance and beyond. They argue that Asian American students do have overall better academic performances, but are rejected for the purpose of racial balancing by the school in order to admit black, white and Latina/ Latino students who are less qualified. Furthermore, not all Asian Americans fit this “model minority” stereotype, which obscures the fact that there are very low graduation rates among some ethnic subgroups of Asian Americans, including those who identify as Vietnamese, Hmong, Bhutanese, Bangladeshi, Burmese, Filipino, Southeast Asians and Cambodian Americans. Meanwhile, Chinese, Taiwanese and Korean Americans enroll and graduate at much higher rates. Continue Reading ›

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A U.S. District Court in Los Angeles has awarded $350,000 to a plaintiff in a racial discrimination lawsuit, finding an airplane manufacturer fostered a hostile work environment and failed to prevent race-based harassment and further was negligent in its hiring, supervision and retention of employees who committed such acts. Although the company, Boeing, denies the allegations and is weighing its options to appeal the verdict, five similar lawsuits against the company are pending – each alleging racial discrimination. racial discrimination lawyer

As detailed by The Press-Telegram, one of the incidents highlighted in the case at trial occurred at a workroom table at a facility in El Segundo, where a white co-worker tied a noose with a strand of rope and then tossed it to the plaintiff seated nearby. Plaintiff, who is black, caught it. He would later say he felt directly threatened, given U.S. history involving the lynching of African Americans. Another time, he said the same co-worker “joked” more than once about plaintiff being at the zoo for a “family reunion.” Once, while working on a top-secret security clearance project building satellites for the U.S. government, he said his colleagues nicknamed him after a pet chimpanzee. He was later humiliated to learn someone had put a piece of tape on his back with the offensive nickname on it – and that he’d walked around with it for hours without anyone telling him.

He and other plaintiffs said they feared (and still do) the possibility of retaliation.  Continue Reading ›

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A California age discrimination lawsuit filed by four women laid off after decades of working for a job placement center say they were treated unfairly due to their age. age discrimination attorney

While the company attributed layoffs last year to budget constraints, the women – all over 40 – said they were all in upper managerial roles at the firm when the layoffs occurred, followed shortly thereafter by hiring younger replacements. Those employees who remained after the layoffs were then given raises of 10 percent. NBC-4 Los Angeles reported in one case, a younger woman with less experience than one of plaintiffs became a supervisor. Another alleged the director asked if she would be retiring anytime soon. One said she felt pressured to return to work early from her medical leave (during which she was undergoing chemotherapy treatments), indicating at one point, because it didn’t seem her supervisors believed the severity of the situation, that she felt compelled to open her shirt and show her scars to her supervisors.

The case is further complicated because the company contracts with Los Angeles County (specifically the Department of Workforce Development, Aging and Community) and receives local, state and federal funds to to provide workforce services to youth, adults and seniors. The County is not named as a defendant in the California age discrimination lawsuit. Plaintiffs say they not only want to be compensated for their losses, but to protect current employees from facing the same fate in the future. Continue Reading ›

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Earlier this year, the California Supreme Court issued a ruling with far-reaching impact to so-called “gig” employers, like Uber and Lyft. These and others with similar employment structures had argued that their drivers were NOT employees, but rather independent contractors. This ruling was a blow to these companies because when workers are classified as employees, they are entitled to receive benefits like minimum wage, regular breaks, overtime pay, protection from sexual harassment and workers’ compensation for injuries. Of course, all this cost the companies money, something they’d been desperately hoping to avoid.employment attorney

Now, according to Bloomberg, these companies are quietly lobbying Democrats in California, seeking a legislative means of overriding the state supreme court’s ruling in April. They’ve been pleading their case to members of the current governor’s cabinet, as well as with his presumed successor and members of the state legislature. They are hoping to either dull the impact of the court’s ruling (with executive action or through passage of a new law) or else scrap it entirely.

Our employee misclassification attorneys in Orange County recognize that such a move could have serious legal implications not only here in California, but potentially echoing throughout the country, as this is an issue with which many states are grappling.  The whole idea of the “gig economy,” which thrives on newer technology such as smartphone apps and constant internet connectivity, is one in which the laws are only now catching up and adapting to these newer features.  Continue Reading ›

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A trucking association representing trucking companies in 11 states is petitioning the U.S. Department of Transportation to intervene in an ongoing legal challenge over state-mandated truck driver breaks.employment misclassification lawyer

The group, Western States Trucking Association, has also filed a lawsuit over the owner-operator status, arguing these two issues impact all trucking carriers operating California – no matter where they are based.

The petition submitted to the DOT last month asks for a declaration that truck drivers hauling overweight and over-sized loads are subject to the federal hours of service rules, which (they argue) should supersede the state’s mandated break requirements. The complaint names as defendants the California Department of Industrial Relations as well as the state attorney, and seeks to a nullification of the state supreme court’s ruling that (they say) effectively “eliminates the use of owner-operators, even on-truck motor carriers,” from the trucking industry. Continue Reading ›

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