California Employment Lawyers Blog

In a recent Riverside employment lawyer blog, our Howard Law attorneys discussed violations of federal labor laws in low wage industries. Wage and hour violations in the restaurant industry continue to be a growing workplace problem--as restaurant employees are often cheated out of their hard-earned wages, when employers engage in unlawful pay practices--such as paying workers cash wages that aren't accurately recorded, paying workers a flat rate for all hours worked instead of adhering to the Fair Labor Standard Act's (FLSA) minimum wage and overtime requirements, and falsifying employees' time and payroll cards.

As Vincent Howard reported in our Costa Mesa employment attorney blog earlier this year, in an effort to crack down on FLSA violations in low wage industries, the U.S. Department of Labor went after a group of restaurants in Long Island, New York, after DOL investigations found a number of pizza restaurants to be in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act--by failing to pay employees minimum wage and overtime compensation, as required by federal law.

According to the DOL, the department has continued this enforcement initiative with Long Island restaurants--finding comprehensive noncompliance with the FLSA's overtime, minimum wage and record-keeping provisions.

Under this initiative, the Wage and Hour Division investigated 46 pasta and pizza restaurants, and brought 578 employees $2,341,507 in back pay, as well as assessing civil money penalties in the amount of $202,315 against the restaurant employers who willfully repeated federal labor law violations.

Continue reading "DOL Recovers Over $2.3M in Wage and Hour Back Wages for 578 NY Restaurant Workers" »

Our Costa Mesa, California labor and employment lawyer blog previously discussed common wage and hour violations in the trucking industry--including wage theft, minimum wage violations and overtime payment violations, as well as the problem of employment misclassification.

In related news, two Massachusetts trucking companies have reached a settlement agreement with the Fair Labor Division of the Attorney General's Office, in order to resolve a wage and hour lawsuit by paying over $225,000 in vacation back wages to 170 former employees.

According to a press release from Attorney General Martha Coakley, in 2009, the Fair Labor Division began investigating two trucking companies, Ryder Truck Rental, Inc. as well as Ryder Integrated Logistics, Inc. after a former employee accused Ryder of failing to pay vacation wages when the employee's employment was terminated.

Upon review of Ryder's payroll documents and vacation policies, the Labor Division found that between January of 2006 and December of 2009, 170 former Ryder employees were not paid their entitled vacation wages at the time of job separation or termination.

Continue reading "Trucking Companies Settle Wage and Hour Lawsuit for Over $225K" »

According to the annual Performance and Accountability Report (PAR) of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, (EEOC), the commission received an unprecedented number of discrimination charges in fiscal year 2011--99,847--the highest number of charges in the EEOC's 46-year history.

The EEOC's PAR, filed earlier this month, showed that in fiscal year 2011, the EEOC staff also brought historic amounts of monetary relief through administrative enforcement--with $364.6 million in benefits for victims of discrimination in the workplace, which was also the highest amount ever obtained in the history of the commission. The fiscal year ended on September 30, 2011, with 78,136 pending charges--a total decrease of 8,202 in discrimination charges, or ten percent. This was the first reduction since 2002, as the pending inventory in the previous years had increased as staffing declined.

As our Irvine employment lawyer blog has recently discussed, the EEOC enforces the federal laws that prohibit workplace discrimination against an employee or job applicant based on race, sex, religion, color, national origin, disability, age (40 years, or older) and genetic information. It is also against the law to discriminate against an individual because the person reported discrimination, filed a discrimination charge, or participated in an employment discrimination lawsuit or investigation.

The EEOC has the authority to investigate discrimination charges against employers who are covered by federal law, and the role of the commission is to accurately and fairly assess the discrimination allegations and then make a finding. If the EEOC discovers that employment discrimination has occurred, the commission can attempt to settle the charges, and if this attempt is not successful, the EEOC has the authority to file an employment lawsuit in order to protect an individual's employment rights. According to the Chair of the EEOC, Jacqueline A. Berrien, the work of the EEOC during this past fiscal year demonstrates what can be achieved when the commission is given the necessary resources to enforce the federal laws that prohibit employment discrimination.

Continue reading "EEOC Sets Record Highs in Monetary Relief, Intake, and Charge Resolution in 2011" »

According to a recent U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, (EEOC) press release that our Rosemead employment attorneys have been following, a Los Angeles-area Medical Center will reportedly pay former female employees $530,000, to settle an EEOC lawsuit alleging the sexual harassment of the female medical staff.

The EEOC investigation reportedly uncovered that from 2007 until 2009, several of the female employees of the Garfield Medical Center, located in Monterey Park, California, were targets of sexual harassment by a male emergency room representative, whose job was to admit patients.

The Garfield Medical Center was found by the EEOC to have allowed the male emergency room representative to sexually harass a group of female hospital employees by subjecting them to sexual propositions, unwanted inappropriate touching, obscene photos, discussions of sexual activities that were graphic, and sexual comments about the female anatomy, including those of patients who were underage.

After reporting the harassment, their complaints were reportedly ignored by the hospital management. One female employee was wrongfully terminated in retaliation for complaining about the harassment, while other employees were driven to quit in order to escape the hostile work environment. Even after repeated complaints to the hospital management, the male employee was not terminated from his job until 2009, over two years after the initial sexual harassment complaints were reported.

Continue reading "Los Angeles-area Medical Center Will Pay $530K in Sexual Harassment Lawsuit Settlement" »

Our Chino Hills labor and employment attorneys have been reading about the recent multi-year initiative launched by the U.S. Department of Labor's (DOL) Wage and Hour Division (WHD) focusing on the gas station industry in New Jersey--where the division uncovered widespread noncompliance with the wage and hour provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), including minimum wage, overtime compensation, and record keeping violations.

According to the DOL press release, the WHD investigated 74 gas station facilities throughout the state during fiscal year 2011, and recovered $1,014,895 in back wages for 295 employees who experienced wage and hour violations and did not receive fair payment for their work.

The DOL investigation revealed that 69 of the gas stations had the BP brand, and the non-BP stations whose operators also owned BP stations were found to have similar FLSA violations.

The FLSA violations were found to include paying workers below the federal minimum wage, $7.25 per hour, paying straight time for all hours worked with no regard to the FLSA overtime requirements, and paying employees cash wages which were "off the books" instead of properly maintaining the records of all employee work hours, wages, and conditions of employment--a requirement under the FLSA.

Continue reading "DOL Initiative Recovers Over $1M in Back Wages for Gas Station Workers" »

Our Carson employment lawyer blog post recently discussed a class action wage and hour lawsuit involving exotic dancers in California and other states, who sued their employers for violating the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) by failing to pay them minimum wage for all hours worked.

In a related Los Angeles, California wage and hour lawsuit, 20 former dancers from a Los Angeles hostess dance club are suing the club for violations of the FLSA, and for subjecting them to illegal sexual harassment.

According to the lawsuit, Club 907 was one of seven hostess dancing clubs in downtown Los Angeles, where customers pay up to $30 to dance and talk with hostesses--but where nudity is prohibited. The club, which closed last year, is being sued by the former hostesses who allege that the club violated the FLSA by failing to pay minimum wage, overtime compensation, and for failing to provide meal and rest breaks, among other wage and hour benefits.

The hostesses are suing Goliath Incorporated, the company that owned Club 907, claiming in the lawsuit that they were compensated only for the time that they actually danced with the customers--even though they were required to work a minimum of 36 hours per week, and often over 40 hours in a work week, with no overtime compensation. One hostess claimed that she would work at the club for 30 hours per week, but only received $50 to $60 per paycheck.

Continue reading "LA Dance Club Hostesses Sue for FLSA Wage and Hour Violations, Harassment" »

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) recently settled a disability discrimination lawsuit that our Carson employment attorneys have been following, after Journal Disposition agreed to pay $55,000 to settle the suit.

Journal Disposition is the former operator of a full-service print, distribution and manufacturing company, called IPC Print Services, that according to the EEOC disability discrimination lawsuit, wrongfully terminated a long-term employee due to his disability. The lawsuit states that after the employee was diagnosed with cancer, he used up the maximum amount of time available under the company's short-term disability insurance policy--which reportedly provides 26 weeks of leave within a rolling 12-month time period.

Before exhausting his work leave, the employee returned back to his job, and began working part-time, while going through rounds of chemotherapy--performing all of the necessary job functions required in his position. When his employee benefits were used up, the company terminated his employment with the understanding that such an action would make him available for rehiring once he was able to work again full-time again.

Before his firing, the employee reportedly made a request for reasonable accommodation to be able to continue working part-time until his chemotherapy treatments ended, in a projected five month period. The printing company reportedly acknowledged the request, but applied the policy regardless of the reasonable nature of the accommodation request, of his ability to perform the job, or whether the request provided any undue hardship on the company's operations.

Continue reading "EEOC Settles Disability Discrimination Lawsuit with Printing Company" »

According to a recent article in the Hollywood Reporter that our Riverside, California employment lawyers have been following, Julie Taymor, an Academy Award nominated director has filed a lawsuit against the producers of Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, for violating her rights by using her directing work in the production without proper compensation.

Taymor who was the original director of the Spider-Man musical, the most expensive theater production in Broadway history, was released from her role as director of the musical due to artistic differences, earlier this year. The show was plagued with difficulties from the start with high-profile performer injuries and poor reviews early on--but has gone on to be a box office success, showing to packed crowds since its November 2010 debut.

Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark is a musical with rock lyrics and music written by Bono and The Edge from U2, and the book written by Glen Berger, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and Taymor. The musical has set the record for being the most expensive production on Broadway, costing a reported $75 million to produce, with a long preview period of performances before the show officially opened. The preview period was reportedly necessary in order to work out the safety issues involving flying stunts that left many cast members with injuries, as well as issues with the story.

After Taymor left the production in March 2011, she reportedly filed an arbitration claim against the Spider-Man musical producers, claiming that she was owed over $500,000 in royalties for her role as the show's original director. Earlier this month, the arbitration hearing was held, and the outcome has not yet been released.

Continue reading "Broadway Director Sues 'Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark' Producers for Compensation" »

As our Riverside, California employment lawyer blog discussed in a recent post, last month, California State Labor Department investigators discovered staggering wage and hour violations at a giant warehouse that handles Wal-Mart goods. The investigators discovered that of two staffing agencies, supplying the temporary manual labor to the massive Mira Loma, California warehouse--operated by a Wal-mart-contractor, Schneider Logistics--failed to keep accurate records of how much money the low-wage workers were properly owed.

One staffing firm, Impact Logistics, Inc. was fined $499,000 for not properly providing itemized wage statements to the over 200 workers who load and unload Wal-Mart products into the warehouse facility. Impact was also issued a warning for neglecting to maintain time records.

Last week, California's Labor Commissioner, Julie A. Su, slapped the second staffing firm, Premiere Warehousing Ventures, with fines that total over $600,000--after state inspectors discovered that the staffing agency had engaged in multiple California wage and hour violations, including denying employees overtime compensation. According to the California Department of Industrial Relations (DIR), the company neglected to provide employees with proper wage statements, and failed to let them see their payroll records--as required by state and federal law.

According to Julie A. Su, California State Labor Commissioner, many workers also may not have received proper payment for all hours worked. Su claimed that the ever-increasing layers of subcontracting in warehouse work can make it difficult to enforce labor laws, especially when subcontractors make a deliberate effort to avoid labor compliance.

Continue reading "CA Labor Commissioner Fines Warehouse Staffing Firms for Alleged Labor Violations" »

In a recent Costa Mesa employment lawyers blog, our attorneys discussed the federal protections under Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, (ADA)--where employers are required to reasonably accommodate the disability of a qualified job applicant or worker, unless the individual's disability causes the employer's business operations suffer an undue hardship.

In related news, this week a former employee of the Huntington Beach City Library, who is deaf, is suing the city after she claims she was wrongfully fired from her job as a library clerk--because of her disability.

According to the lawsuit, Merrie Sager, 32, filed a disability discrimination complaint with the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (FEHC) on March 8, stating that the Huntington Beach Library management team was no longer willing to reasonably accommodate her disabilities, and that her job termination was a result of retaliation--as she had repeatedly filed complaints about the ongoing lack of reasonable accommodation.

The Orange County Register reports that when Sager was first employed in 1978 at the library, she fully disclosed her disabilities to the city library, as well as her need for written instructions on work assignments, and the assistance of a sign language interpreter to help her communicate at staff meetings.

Continue reading "City of Huntington Beach Sued by Deaf Library Clerk for Wrongful Termination and Discrimination" »

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, a federal appeals court recently reinstated a California class action employee misclassification lawsuit, filed by 1,000 SuperShuttle drivers who want to be classified as employees and not independent contractors--so they can receive important workplace benefits and protections under state law, like overtime compensation, and so they will no longer have to pay for their vans, or buy fuel.

The appeals court decision, a 3-0 ruling, overturned a 2009 ruling, where the lawsuit was dismissed by a U.S. District judge in San Francisco, Judge Jeffrey White--who claimed that only the state Public Utilities Commission (PUC) regulating transportation companies, has the authority to overrule the driver classification--as the PUC allowed shuttle companies to originally classify drivers as independent contractors.

The drivers claim that because SuperShuttle regulates their employment operations in great detail by directing and prescribing their driving routes, their shuttle fares and every detail of their employee attire, they should have a strong case for changing their employee status. The drivers claim that SuperShuttle has violated the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) as well as California law by misclassifying the employees as independent contractors instead of employees--and failing to pay minimum wage, overtime and failing to reimburse the drivers for expenses, among other alleged violations.

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision claimed that Judge White must in fact decide, instead of the PUC, whether the shuttle transportation service exercises enough control over the work of the SuperShuttle drivers to give them reclassification, and to make them employees.

Continue reading "SuperShuttle Class Action Employee Misclassification Lawsuit Reinstated by U.S. Court" »

Our Orange County labor and employment attorney blog recently discussed a U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) investigation into two Mexican restaurants in Tennessee, after the restaurants were found to have willfully and repeatedly violated federal wage and hour laws, by failing to pay regular and tipped employees with minimum wage, overtime payment and for failing to comply to the FLSA's record-keeping requirements.

The DOL continues to go after low-wage industries across the country, like the restaurant industry, that prey upon vulnerable workers who are often unaware of the state and federal labor and employment laws that protect them, or who are too scared to stand up for their employment rights.

In a related DOL wage and hour settlement from last month, a restaurant in Louisiana agreed to pay $83,569 in back wages to 43 former and current restaurant employees, after the company was found by the DOL to have profited from allowing the employees to work, without properly compensating them.

According to the DOL investigation, Superior Bar & Grill was found to have required bartenders, wait staff and bussers to pay for customer walk-outs, when customers place orders and leave before paying, along with incorrect customer orders, and failed to pay the employees for all hours worked--which caused the employees' wages to fall below the minimum wage level. The employer also violated the FLSA by failing to compensate workers for overtime hours worked, and neglecting to keep FLSA-required records of all employee hours worked.

Continue reading " Restaurant Pays $83K in Back Wages for Overtime, Minimum Wage Violations of FLSA" »

Last month a group of workers at a Riverside, California warehouse that handles goods headed to Wal-Mart stores across the country, filed a California class action wage and hour lawsuit, claiming that they have been working under abusive conditions, after being regularly shortchanged on their wages, and required to work in a dangerous working environment.

Everardo Carrillo, along with five other low-wage workers from the Schneider Logistics-run warehouse, filed the class action lawsuit last month, claiming that they were consistently denied proper pay, and were forced to perform strenuous unskilled labor in extremely hot conditions. The workers claim that when they would question the total hours worked, after receiving less compensation than they felt they were owed, their bosses responded with the threat of retaliation, or with actual retaliation--by sending them home without pay, or refusing to give them more work the next day.

The lawsuit named Schneider and three of its staffing contractors who supply the temporary labor to Schneider's Wal-mart distribution facility. According to the lawsuit, the majority of the low-wage workers at the warehouse are Latino immigrants, who do not speak the English language, are unaware of their California employment rights, and have an education that does not go beyond the middle school level.

According to the California class action wage and hour lawsuit, most of the workers in the warehouse used to be directly employed by Schneider, earning an hourly wage of between $12 and $17 per hour, with employment benefits. Over the past five years, the workers claim that the proportion of direct worker hires in the warehouse declined dramatically to around 25%, with the hourly wages dropping as well. The workers are accusing the companies of enacting an unlawful employment scheme to depress the workers' wages through outsourcing and subcontractor layering.

Continue reading "Riverside Warehouse Investigated by CA Labor Officials, Sued by Workers for Wage Theft, Abusive Conditions" »

As labor and employment attorneys based in Costa Mesa, California, we have been following the recent announcement that Oracle Corporation, the technology giant, has agreed to compensate over 1,725 employees in Northern California, with $35 million in a class action wage and hour settlement.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, preliminary approval was granted last week by a Superior Court Judge, to settle the 2007 class action overtime lawsuit--filed on behalf of three groups of employees who worked for the company between 2003 and 2006, and claim that they were wrongfully denied overtime payment.

The class of employees reportedly includes technical analysts who answer customer questions and provide support, quality assurance employees, who test the company's software, and project managers, who perform task coordination for other employees--all of whom claim they were misclassified.

Oracle reportedly argued that the employees were either administrators or computer professionals, which would make them exempt from state overtime laws--requiring that employees are paid one and one-half their regular pay rate when working over eight hours in a day or beyond forty hours in a week of work.

Continue reading "Oracle Will Pay $35M in Class Action Overtime Lawsuit Settlement" »

In a related Carson, California employment lawyer blog, our labor and employment attorneys reported about the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's (EEOC) role as the protector of the federal laws prohibiting disability discrimination in the workplace.

Under Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, (ADA) a disabled and qualified job applicant or employee is defined as being an individual who can perform their necessary job functions, with or without reasonable accommodation--an adjustment or modification given by the employer in order to help disabled employees have equal employment opportunities.

Employers are expected, under the ADA, to reasonably accommodate the disability of a qualified worker or job applicant, unless the disability of the employee creates an undue hardship on the employer's business operations. A reasonable accommodation includes making job facilities that are available to employees equally as accessible to disabled individuals, modifying a job to benefit the disabled employee by changing a job position or work schedule, or getting equipment or devices for disabled employees to help assist them in the employment process.

According to the EEOC, not all requests for reasonable accommodations are the same, and they depend on the individual needs of each disabled employee or applicant. Examples of reasonable accommodation include:

• Providing a deaf job applicant with a sign language interpreter during an interview for a position within the company.
• Providing a blind employee with the assistance of another person to help read information on an employee bulletin.
• Allowing a diabetic employee to restructure their workday to include regularly scheduled breaks necessary in order to monitor their blood sugar levels.
• Allowing an employee who is suffering from cancer to have treatments for radiation or chemotherapy.

Continue reading "Employee Disabilities and Reasonable Accommodations Under the ADA" »

In continuing its fight against wage theft and violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), has ordered two Tennessee restaurants to pay $39,232 in overtime back pay and minimum wages to twenty-three restaurant workers, after the restaurants were found to have willfully and repeatedly violated federal wage and hour laws. The DOL Wage and Hour Division (WHD) also assessed $4,301 in civil money penalties for these violations--as the company was previously investigated in 2008, and found to be in violation of the FLSA record-keeping requirements.

Our Irvine, California employment attorneys have been following the WHD Nashville District Office's announcement that the division is committed to ensuring that Tennessee employers who routinely employ low-wage workers, especially in the restaurant industry, are complying with FLSA laws--so that employees are protected from being denied overtime payments or minimum wage. The FLSA also protects employers who depend on the DOL to ensure that no companies receive unfair advantages by avoiding federal laws.

The wage and hour investigations reportedly revealed that the La Campina Mexican Grill Restaurants routinely and willfully failed to properly compensate and record compensation for employees for all hours worked during a workweek--violating the minimum wage, overtime payment and record-keeping provisions of the FLSA. The employees were reportedly paid a flat salary that did not incorporate the federal minimum wage, $7.25, for all working hours. The company also created records of employee hours that were inaccurate, in regard to the rates of payment and the wages that were actually paid.

Under the FLSA, employees must be paid at least $7.25 for every hour worked, and also receive one and one-half their normal pay rates when working over a 40-hour workweek, including bonuses, incentive compensation and commissions. Employers are also required under federal law to keep records of all accurate employee hours. For tipped employees, employers are only required to pay $2.13 per hour in direct wages, if that hourly wage with the added tips equals at least the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour. If the tips and wages combined do not total the federal minimum wage, the employer must pay the difference.

Continue reading "Tennessee Restaurants To Pay Overtime Back Wages for Willful and Repeated FLSA Violations" »

In a previous Orange County employment lawyers blog, our attorneys discussed a recent U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) disability discrimination lawsuit settlement, where a disabled hotel front desk clerk was denied reasonable accommodation and fired, as a result of his autism.

The role of the EEOC is to enforce the federal laws that make it illegal to discriminate against an employee or applicant for employment, because of the person's disability. According to Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, (ADA), it is against the law to discriminate against disabled and qualified individuals in the job application process, or in hiring, advancement, employment training, job termination, compensation and other conditions and privileges of employment.

The commission also has the authority to investigate all charges of disability discrimination in the workplace, and to accurately assess the charges. If the commission finds that a disabled employee has been discriminated against, the EEOC can attempt to settle the discrimination charge, and if this attempt is not successful, the commission has the authority to file a disability discrimination lawsuit on behalf of the disabled individuals, in order to protect their employment rights.

Under the ADA, a disabled individual is a person who:

• Has a physical or mental impairment that seriously limits the person from one or more major life activities
• Has a record of this disability, and impairment
• Is regarded as an individual with such a disability, or impairment

Continue reading "EEOC Disability Discrimination Protection under the ADA" »

Legendary Los Angeles Lakers superstar Shaquille O'Neal has filed an employment lawsuit this month against a former information technology employee, for invasion of privacy and allegedly selling his personal emails on the open market--and therefore damaging his reputation.

According to the lawsuit, that our Santa Ana employment lawyers have been following, O'Neal hired Shawn Darling in 2007 and paid him around $150 per hour as an Information Technology specialist, to set up his audio and computer systems, keep his electronic communications, and to create and register a personal domain name for the former NBA player. O'Neal claims that he hired the man unaware of the fact that he had been convicted of a bank fraud felony.

While performing his tasks, Darling reportedly requested and got all of O'Neal's passwords, which he allegedly used outside of his job, in order to access Shaq's personal emails. Darling is being accused of selling O'Neal's personal information to other people as well as Internet sites, which then published articles that reportedly damaged Shaq's reputation.

In August of 2010, according to the Hollywood Reporter, Darling's attorney threatened O'Neal, with the continued use of the electronic email communications if he didn't fork over $12 million--to which Shaq reportedly refused. Darling then filed a lawsuit against O'Neal, accusing him of being the computer hacker--by hacking into voicemails, trying to frame Darling for a criminal offense, and trying to erase digital evidence of affairs.

Continue reading "Former NBA Superstar Shaq Sues Former Employee Over Stolen Emails" »

According to a recent news report from the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) that our Costa Mesa labor and employment attorneys have been following, a local California hotel operator and developer has been ordered to pay over $132,500 to settle a disability discrimination lawsuit, filed by the commission on behalf of a former Autistic hotel employee.

The EEOC charged that Tarsadia Hotels, known as Comfort Suites in business, discriminated against a former front desk employee, working in a San Diego, California Comfort Suites Hotel, by denying him reasonable accommodation for his disability during his employment. Before this position, the hotel clerk had previous experience in the hospitality industry, where his work garnered him a positive recommendation for employment--but claims that he experienced disability discrimination and wrongful termination at Comfort Suites, because of his autism.

The lawsuit claims that shortly after the employee began his work at Comfort Suites, he looked into free job coach services from the state--offering autism-specific training techniques to help the clerk learn to master his work responsibilities. Tarsadia reportedly refused to allow the clerk the assistance of a job coach, and then terminated the clerk's employment.

As our Anaheim employment lawyers blog has reported in a recent post, under the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) it is against the law to discriminate against individuals who are qualified, yet suffer from disabilities in job application, hiring, job advancement, compensation, training, firing, and other employment terms and conditions.

Continue reading "California's Comfort Suites Settles Disability Discrimination Lawsuit for $132,500" »

In a Carson, California employment attorney blog from last month, our lawyers discussed a recent gender discrimination lawsuit settlement, one of the largest in the U.S. Department of Labor's (DOL) Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) history--where Tyson Fresh Meats Inc. agreed to pay $2.25 million to more than 1,650 female job applicants, who were discriminated against based on their gender, and denied equal employment opportunities within the company.

In another recent press release from the OFCCP, Caviness Beef Packers Ltd., has also agreed to a discrimination settlement that will resolve charges that the company engaged in race and gender discrimination against 746 qualified Asian, white, black and female job applicants in the federal contractor's two facilities for meat processing.

According to the OFCCP's Director, Patricia A. Shiu, discrimination is not tolerated by employers who are given lucrative government contracts. Caviness reportedly holds government contracts with the U.S. Department of Agriculture that total over $20 million.

The OFCCP reportedly conducted a planned compliance review of both meat plants, and found the company responsible for violating Executive Order 11246 by neglecting to meet its federal contractor obligations--ensuring that all job applicants who are qualified receive employment consideration that is equal, without bias based on race, sex, color, national origin, or religion.

Continue reading "Federal Beef Contractor To Pay $600K for Hiring Discrimination Based on Race, Gender" »