PHILADELPHIA – A federal judge has rejected a Delaware County school district’s attempt to dismiss an amended version of a lawsuit brought by a former public safety officer and hall monitor, alleging race and religion-based discrimination.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Carol Sandra Moore Wells authored an opinion to that effect on June 19, in George Smith’s litigation versus the Southeast Delco School District.
“Plaintiff is an African-American and practicing Christian. He commenced work for defendant in January 2012 and, for most of his tenure, served as a Public Safety Officer. Plaintiff alleges that he was qualified for the job. At all times relevant, Plaintiff had a second job, which defendant had knowledge of and approved,” Wells stated.
“On May 17, 2018, plaintiff was praying at work; employees of other religions who were not African-American were allowed to pray at work. On this day, plaintiff was confronted by a supervisor, who told him not to pray at work. Plaintiff believed his supervisor’s order constituted harassment based on his religion and race.”
Smith filed a written complaint with the district about racial and religious discrimination on May 18, 2018 and on June 4, 2018, he requested that the defendant accommodate his request to pray at work because of his sincere belief that his religion required him to pray at work, which he shared with the defendant. Following this request plaintiff followed up with defendant several times, but received no response.
On June 22, 2018, Smith says he was demoted to the position of hall monitor; this demotion changed plaintiff’s job title and job duties. Four days later, the defendant disciplined plaintiff based upon events that had occurred before his May 18, 2018 complaint of racial and religious discrimination; plaintiff had never previously been disciplined by defendant.
“After June 26, 2018, plaintiff’s supervisors began to harass plaintiff by disparaging his work and aggressively monitoring him. Plaintiff still was not allowed to pray at work, which impeded his exercise of his religion; employees of other religions and other races were allowed to pray at work during this time,” Wells said.
“Smith alleged that the defendant had no business-related reason to shift his schedule, but rather, did so to retaliate against him and Smith informed defendant that he thought the schedule change was retaliatory, yet defendant continued to harass him, per the motion.”
Smith believed that the defendant’s management-level employees knew directly or had constructive knowledge of the harassment he suffered. Finally, on Sept. 20, 2018, Smith was constructively discharged from employment.
Wells addressed each of the plaintiff’s counts in turn, starting with her view that Smith’s claims under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act were adequately pled.
Though the defendant criticized the plaintiff’s not naming of employees of engaging in the alleged behavior, Wells said that was no reason for the complaint to be thrown out.
“Whether plaintiff can ultimately prove his claims, is not a proper reason to dismiss the first amended complaint,” Wells said.
Further, Wells added that Smith’s claims of being discriminated against on the grounds of being African-American and a Christian were also sufficient at this time.
“These allegations adequately plead Title VII and PHRA claims for religious and race-based discrimination,” according to Wells.
Wells leaned the same way on Smith’s claims of a hostile work environment, finding they satisfied a five-factor test associated with such claims.
“Plaintiff alleges that he was subjected to religious discrimination (perhaps also racial discrimination) because he was ordered not pray while on the job, during work hours, yet others – who were not Christian and not African-American – were allowed to do so. This invidious discrimination continued from May 17, 2018 until plaintiff stopped working in September 2018 and would be perceived by all who worked with plaintiff; hence, it could be viewed as pervasive,” Wells said.
“Plaintiff alleges that defendant’s discrimination caused him emotional pain and suffering and a reasonable Christian subjected to this invidious discrimination would certainly suffer, i.e., be adversely affected by it. Finally, since the persons imposing the discrimination on plaintiff were his supervisors, there appears to be respondeat superior liability.”
Lastly, Wells addressed Smith’s final pair of claims – that racial discrimination interfered in his employment and retaliation against him prevented him from practicing his religion.
“Plaintiff explicitly pleads that his supervisor’s discriminatory actions were carried out pursuant to a policy, custom or practice. Whether there was such a liability-triggering policy, custom or practice, is a question of law, not fact, which this court must decide before plaintiff’s Section 1981 claim can be submitted to the jury,” Wells stated.
“Plaintiff has pleaded sufficient facts to plausibly claim that defendant prevented him from praying at work by ordering him not to do so and not acting upon plaintiff’s request for an accommodation to pray at work. Hence, defendant’s motion to dismiss count eight is denied.”
Wells denied the district’s dismissal motion in its entirety and allowed Smith’s claims to proceed, with an implementing order following.
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania case 2:19-cv-03150
From the Pennsylvania Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com