The employee asked for help completing his work. Months later, the unfinished work became the reason for firing him. TL;DR: A federal appeals court rejected an employee’s intentional disability discrimination claim because the decisionmaker did not know about his disabilities. But it revived his failure-to-accommodate claim because HR and the
Browse the headlines about DEI-training backlash lawsuits and they usually go one way: a white employee gets offended and sues over it. This one, initiated by the EEOC, ain’t that at all. TL;DR: The EEOC has sued a St. Louis university, alleging it retaliated against a Black senior program manager
Workplace profanity was business as usual, right up until it accompanied a complaint about racism. TL;DR: An employee used repeated profanity while complaining to his supervisor about alleged race discrimination. The employer fired him eight days later, but a federal appeals court revived his Section 1981 retaliation claim because a
A judge joked about his female employee’s sexuality and kept a mug decorated with cartoon genitalia in his own courtroom. The same judge required her to burn a full day of sick leave every time she needed an hour off for a medical appointment. A federal appeals court still ruled
A supervisor approved the employee’s hairstyle at her interview, then sent her home for wearing it on day one. A federal appeals court says the case over what happened next isn’t finished, for either side. TL;DR: A federal appeals court vacated an $811,264 jury verdict for a former security contractor
An employee’s attempt to end fifty years of discrimination-law precedent went nowhere on appeal. But, two of the three judges who rejected it wrote separately to say they’d take another case just to do it. TL;DR: A federal appeals court affirmed summary judgment for the employer on race discrimination, retaliation,
A supervisor swore in an affidavit that he had no idea an employee was disabled. His own meeting notes said otherwise, and that contradiction just cost a Texas community college its win. TL;DR: A federal appeals court revived a former college employee’s disability discrimination, disability retaliation, and FMLA retaliation claims
One racial slur wasn’t enough to put a company on notice. A federal appeals court explained why and upheld the jury’s verdict for the employer. TL;DR: A federal appeals court affirmed a jury verdict for an employer in a race-based hostile work environment case, holding that one earlier incident involving
An employer told the EEOC one story to get a discrimination charge dismissed as too late. It told the court a different story to win summary judgment. The judge noticed. TL;DR: A magistrate judge recommended denying summary judgment on the EEOC’s age discrimination claim against a meat processing company, finding
Roughly one in ten of a railroad’s train and engine employees marked off using FMLA leave on Christmas Day. The railroad ran that spike through an algorithm, then a hearing, then a dishonesty finding, and a federal court just said a jury needs to check that whole chain. TL;DR: A
She reported the harassment and lost her job. Her supervisor testified that the man she reported wasn’t disciplined; he got training instead. TL;DR: The Seventh Circuit revived an HR manager’s sex discrimination and retaliation claims after she was fired following months of reporting sexist conduct by other managers, holding a
Last year, a jury hit the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), the professional association many HR practitioners look to for certifications and guidance, with a $10 million punitive damages verdict. Now its own insurance company says that’s SHRM’s bill to pay, not theirs. TL;DR: SHRM’s employment practices insurer has
Let’s be honest: nobody dreams of ending up on the wrong end of an employment lawsuit. And yet, every year, well-meaning HR teams and in-house counsel find themselves scrambling to answer the question, “Wait, how did this become a case?” Enter Andrew Lacy, Jr. — a man who spent years
A coworker allegedly groped her and threatened her on shift. Years later, she got fired not for reporting it, but for how she finally hit back. TL;DR: An EMT alleged a coworker had harassed and groped her for years but never filed a claim over it. Years later, she retaliated