Our clients are typically employers, but this decision from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit (the appellate court for Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky and Tennessee) on Sept. 28 illustrates one piece of advice we would give an aggrieved employee if asked: Don’t quit! (We’re not changing sides, by the way.) Steve Fletcher, a white registered nurse, sued his employer alleging racial discrimination, and his story has many hallmarks of discrimination cases we see every day:
- A new supervisor who, it seems, had heightened the enforcement of rules in comparison to a predecessor. (Both the current and past supervisor are African-American.)
- A complaint by Fletcher to HR of racist actions against him, including that he was being singled out for the enforcement of policies; he claimed HR did not respond to his complaint
- Fletcher was placed on a final warning, in large part for inadequate patient charting. He signed the warning under duress and, he claimed, without the opportunity to respond to the infractions