Congratulations to APALC and the EEOC!

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. - Delano Regional Medical Center (DRMC), an acute care hospital in California's San Joaquin Valley, will pay $975,000 to settle a lawsuit filed by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and the Asian Pacific American Legal Center (APALC) on behalf of a class of approximately 70 Filipino-American hospital workers. The settlement, announced today, resolves the EEOC's and APALC's charges that the workers endured ongoing harassment and discrimination due to their national origin, stemming from the top levels of hospital management. 

Since at least 2006, the Filipino-American hospital workers, mostly nursing staff, alleged that they were the targets of harassing comments, undue scrutiny and discipline particularly when speaking with a Filipino accent or in Filipino languages like Tagalog or Ilocano. Supervisors, staff, and even volunteers were allegedly encouraged to act as vigilantes, constantly berating and reprimanding Filipino-American employees for nearly six years. According to the EEOC, staff constantly made fun of their accents, ordering them to speak English even when they were already speaking in English. Some Filipino-American workers endured humiliating threats of arrest if they did not speak English and were told to go back to the Philippines. In a particularly offensive incident, an employee sprayed air freshener on a claimant's lunch due to the offender's self-professed hatred of Filipino food.  

FILED UNDER: Discrimination | EEOC | Immigrant Workers | News

As the Sacramento Bee aptly puts it, "Do you want your banker acting like an immigration agent?" Last Thursday, Judge Charles Breyer of the Northern District of California dismissed a complaint brought by Luis Martinez-Rodriguez, a Sacramento gardener, homeowner, and father of U.S. citizens who had three accounts and a morthgage with the Bank of America. Martinez's nightmare began when a Bank of America agent called him into the bank for a meeting, and reported him to Yuba County authorities for identity theft. County authorities turned him over to ICE, who then began removal proceedings.

FILED UNDER: DHS/USCIS | Discrimination | Immigrant Workers | Immigration | Litigation