Justice Department Files Lawsuit Against the City of Dallas Alleging Race Discrimination and Retaliation
June 24, 2008
- The Department of Justice announced today that it has filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas against the city of Dallas, alleging that the city subjected Frenchell Willis, an African-American and a former general laborer for the city, to discrimination on the basis of his race by terminating Willis from his position as a general laborer in the Wastewater Operations Division of the City’s Water Utilities Department. The complaint also alleges that the city subjected Willis to retaliation by terminating him for opposing conduct that he reasonably believed to be unlawful under Title VII.
Willis was assigned to work as a general laborer in the Dallas Water Utilities Department in October 2006. Willis reported that his immediate supervisor referred to Willis using racial slurs. On the day Willis reported the use of racial slurs by his immediate supervisor to senior management in the Dallas Water Utilities Department, Willis was terminated by the city.
“Title VII prohibits discrimination in employment and protects individuals from retaliation when they exercise their rights under the law,” said Grace Chung Becker, Acting Assistant Attorney General of the Civil Rights Division. “The Department is committed to enforcing all the federal civil rights laws, including Title VII, under its jurisdiction.”
New Outreach to Blacks as Border Patrol Grows
June 22, 2008
RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD, New York Times
- Nearly 1,500 miles from his post at the Mexican border, Cyril V. Atherton, a Border Patrol agent, embarked on one of his trickiest missions.
He was here recruiting young blacks to an agency few had ever heard of, trying to entice them to the hot, arid Southwest, where few blacks live, for a job that requires learning Spanish proficient enough to know if their lives are in danger while arresting as many as 100 people at a time.
Any questions? “I’m just thinking about the snakes,” said Cassandra Holland, crinkling her nose after watching a promotional video filled with agents in adventurous exploits in the desert.
It was a measure of Mr. Atherton’s persuasion — “I can’t say you won’t see one, but you don’t have to hunt them out,” he said — that Ms. Holland filled out an application, joining several hundred others who have applied since the recruitment drive by the agency’s Minority Recruitment Strike Team began in January.
Justice Department Files Employment Discrimination Lawsuit Against the City of Jackson, Alabama
June 10, 2008
- The Justice Department today announced the filing of a lawsuit against the city of Jackson, Ala., in the District Court for the Southern District of Alabama in Mobile, alleging that the city discharged Virginia Savage, an African American, from her employment as a circulation clerk at the city’s municipal library in retaliation for her complaints of racial discrimination and harassment by her supervisors, in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Title VII prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin.
Savage was employed at the library from approximately September 2002 until May 2004. In February 2004, Savage submitted a written complaint to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), stating that her supervisors were discriminating against her on the basis of her race. As the complaint alleges, on or about May 7, 2004, the city of Jackson, through its agents at the library, discharged Savage from her employment “due to unacceptable conduct.”
“Federal law guarantees equal access to employment opportunities without regard to race and prohibits employers from discriminating in the terms and conditions of employment,” said Grace Chung Becker, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “Employers cannot retaliate against workers who either seek equal employment opportunities or oppose unlawful employment practices.”
More racist e-mails in Secret Service lawsuit
May 28, 2008
EILEEN SULLIVAN and MATT APUZZO, Associated Press
- A man suing the Secret Service for racial discrimination has sent offensive e-mails of his own, according to new evidence filed in court.
The court documents include e-mails sent by plaintiff Reginald Moore, who is black, containing a joke about a black woman hitting her daughter and a picture of a wedding reception at a White Castle hamburger restaurant. The Secret Service declined to talk about the recent filings.
This is the latest twist in an eight-year-old racial discrimination case against the Secret Service. A group of black employees say the agency has passed over black agents for promotion. They say white colleagues and supervisors regularly use a racial epithet to refer to criminal suspects and black leaders of other countries. The lawsuit claims the Secret Service has always had a discriminatory culture — a claim the agency has consistently denied.
Last month an employee found a noose in one of the Secret Service’s training centers. A worker who tied the noose out of canine training rope has since been placed on administrative leave, according to the agency.
As part of the discrimination lawsuit, the Secret Service was ordered to turn over evidence. The agency paid an outside auditor more than $2 million to search 20 million e-mails and other electronic documents dating back 16 years.
Among the 10 e-mails submitted to the court earlier this month in a separate filing were jokes circulated within the agency that referred to: the way a “20-year-old 5th grader” in Harlem spoke; assassination of the Rev. Jesse Jackson; and the work ethic of a black golf caddy.
One of the e-mails was sent by a deputy assistant director, who has since been suspended. In addition, one of the supervisors who sent an e-mail was on Sen. Barack Obama’s security detail for the past year. The supervisor is no longer on the security detail and has been promoted to a position at the agency’s Washington headquarters.
The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court in Washington in 2000. Lawyers say the Secret Service has delayed turning over evidence in the case. They are scheduled to argue that issue in court Thursday.
In 2007, 80 percent of the people who worked at the Secret Service were white, and 10 percent were black, according to data obtained by The Associated Press. The remaining 10 percent were of other races. In the agency’s senior leadership, whites made up about 75 percent and blacks 13 percent. Blacks make up about 12 percent of the United States’ population.
The Secret Service investigates counterfeiting cases and protects presidents, vice presidents, their family members and other dignitaries. The agency, previously part of the Treasury Department, became part of the Homeland Security Department in 2002.
State prisons prep for federally ordered integration
May 26, 2008
Tanya Schevitz, San Francisco Chronicle
- San Quentin State Prison inmate Lexy Good is white, hangs out with whites on the prison exercise yard and must be careful not to associate with blacks and Latinos. No cards, no basketball outside the color lines.
Those are the unwritten inmate rules of prison life. People stick to their own race. Good, who’s doing a short stretch for receiving stolen property, likes it that way.
“We segregate amongst ourselves because I’d rather hang out with white people, and blacks would rather hang out with people of their own race,” said Good, 33, of Walnut Creek. “Look at suburbia. Look at Oakland. Look at Beverly Hills. People in society self-segregate.”
Soon that may change in the prisons.
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