Category Archives: Race discrimination

Pending legislation, Race discrimination, Retaliation claims, WV Human Rights Act, WV Legislation

Legislative Update: Insurance industry seeks amendment to West Virginia Human Rights Act

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Insur­ance com­pa­nies have been urg­ing the West Vir­ginia Leg­is­la­ture to pass leg­is­la­tion to over­turn the West Vir­ginia Supreme Court’s deci­sion in Michael v. Appalachi­an Heat­ing, LLC, 701 S.E.2d 116 (June 11, 2010). In Michael, the West Vir­ginia Supreme Court held that the West Vir­ginia Human Rights Act pro­hib­it­ed dis­crim­i­na­tion by an insur­ance com­pa­ny in set­tling claims cov­ered by an insur­ance policy.

The Michael Decision

Gen­er­al­ly, the Human Rights Act pro­hibits dis­crim­i­na­tion (1) in the work­place, (2) in places of pub­lic accom­mo­da­tion (like hotels, shop­ping cen­ters), and (3) in con­nec­tion with trans­ac­tions involv­ing hous­ing and real estate (like rent­ing apart­ments and buy­ing houses).

But at issue in Michael was sec­tion 5–11‑9(7) of the Human Rights Act, which was not lim­it­ed to those three cat­e­gories of activ­i­ty. Here is the rel­e­vant lan­guage in sec­tion 5–11‑9(7)(A);

It shall be an unlaw­ful dis­crim­i­na­to­ry prac­tice [based on race, reli­gion, col­or, nation­al ori­gin, ances­try, sex, age, and disability] …

(7) For any per­son, employ­er, employ­ment agency, labor orga­ni­za­tion, own­er, real estate bro­ker, real estate sales­man or finan­cial insti­tu­tion to:

(A) Engage in [1] any form of threats or reprisal, or to [2] engage in, or hire, or con­spire with oth­ers to com­mit acts or activ­i­ties of any nature, the pur­pose of which is to harass, degrade, embar­rass or cause phys­i­cal harm or eco­nom­ic loss or [3] to aid, abet, incite, com­pel or coerce any per­son to engage in any of the unlaw­ful dis­crim­i­na­to­ry prac­tices defined in this section .…

In sub­part (7)(A) above I have brack­et­ed the three spe­cif­ic caus­es of action (legal the­o­ries) which the Supreme Court said are dis­cernible in sub­part (7)(A). I have also bold­ed the sec­ond cause of action, which was the key cause of action at issue in the Michael case.

Con­tin­ue read­ing Leg­isla­tive Update: Insur­ance indus­try seeks amend­ment to West Vir­ginia Human Rights Act →
Democracy, Race discrimination

Martin Luther King; His entire “I Have a Dream” speech

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Today is the 47th Anniver­sary of Dr. Mar­tin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream Speech” giv­en on the steps of the Lin­coln Memo­r­i­al. We are now two gen­er­a­tions removed from that speech. Worse, we live in the age of MTV, Twit­ter, and 30-sec­ond sound­bites on the evening news. So all too often, we see only bite-sized snip­pets from Dr. King’s speech, so I want­ed to post the entire speech on this video from YouTube:

Click here for a site that has the tran­script, audio, and video of the speech.

Attorney's Fees, Back and Front Pay Issues, Constructive discharge, Emotional Distress Damages, Employment policies, Hostile work environment, Prompt remedial action, Race discrimination, Result for Employee, Retaliation claims, WV Human Rights Act, WV Human Rights Commission, WV Supreme Court

The disastrous consequences of the N‑word in the workplace. Just ask Dr. Laura!

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Okay, this arti­cle has noth­ing to do with Dr. Lau­ra Sch­lessinger and her “rant” in which she used the N‑word repeat­ed­ly on her radio pro­gram when respond­ing to an African-Amer­i­can caller. But the ensu­ing con­tro­ver­sy (see arti­cles for and against Dr. Lau­ra), and her deci­sion to end her long-run­ning radio pro­gram, high­light the extra­or­di­nary sig­nif­i­cance of the N‑word term in Amer­i­can society.

The West Vir­ginia Supreme Court recent­ly dealt with the N‑word in a case that high­lights the great risks for employ­ers when that word enters the workplace.

In PAR Elec­tri­cal Con­trac­tors, Inc. v. Bev­elle , 225 W. Va. 624, 695 S.E.2d 854, 2010 WL 2244096 (June 3, 2010) (per curi­am), the West Vir­ginia Supreme Court dealt with a claim of a racial­ly based hos­tile work envi­ron­ment under the West Vir­ginia Human Rights Act, and con­clud­ed that the West Vir­ginia Human Rights Com­mis­sion was jus­ti­fied in find­ing for the employ­ee. The deci­sion was unan­i­mous. Click here for the WV Human Rights Com­mis­sion’s deci­sion which was affirmed by the WV Supreme Court.

A Single Day, With the N‑Word Again and Again

PAR Elec­tri­cal was build­ing “giant tow­ers” for a high volt­age elec­tri­cal trans­mis­sion line. Richard Wayne Bev­elle was hired by PAR Elec­tri­cal on March 22, 2005, and, after work­ing as a “ground­man” assem­bling the tow­er bases, was assigned to load heli­copters with parts to con­struct the tow­ers (this heli­copter job was described as a “gravy job” by the Human Rights Com­mis­sion). Mr. Bev­elle is African-American.

Con­tin­ue read­ing The dis­as­trous con­se­quences of the N‑word in the work­place. Just ask Dr. Lau­ra! →