U.S. Federal Legislation: Discrimination

In a settlement with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), a company that fuels planes at airports has agreed to pay $1.9 million to black and Hispanic employees who claim they were discriminated against. Though the company admitted no wrongdoing, it also agreed to conduct sensitivity and diversity training as part of the agreement. According to the EEOC, company employees waved KKK membership cards at black and Hispanic employees. Also, nooses and drawings of swastikas were common, and Hispanic employees were forced to ride in the back of shuttle buses. One employee, Francisco Ochoa, went to his manager to complain about the discrimination. Ochoa saw himself drawn in a racially offensive cartoon that had been placed under glass on the manager’s desk.

An Illinois appellate court has ruled that the parents of a child molested by her school bus driver can proceed with her lawsuit against the school. The school argued that it was not a common carrier and could not, therefore, be held liable for Green’s claims of negligent hiring, assault and battery, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. (Under state law common carriers are liable for the wrongdoing of employees regardless of whether that employee was acting within the scope of employment.) The court ruled that the school was not a common carrier but, because of the special nature of its relationship to students, it owed an even higher duty of care to the plaintiff’s daughter.