LEGAL BRIEFS: Walgreens Agrees to $20 Million Settlement

In July 2007, the EEOC announced a $20 million proposed consent decree resolving a systemic race discrimination lawsuit against Walgreens, the Illinois-based national drug store chain.

The proposed settlement was filed with U.S. District Judge G. Patrick Murphy of the Southern District of Illinois, with a request for his preliminary approval (EEOC v. Walgreen Co., S.D. Il. 07-CV-172-GPM and Tucker v. Walgreen Co., S.D. Il. 05-CV-440-GPM).

The EEOC’s suit alleged that Walgreens discriminated against African American retail management and pharmacy employees in promotion, compensation and assignment. In addition to the monetary relief for an estimated 10,000 class members, the consent decree prohibits store assignments based on race. The decree is subject to final approval by Judge Murphy following a fairness hearing.

“We commend Walgreens for working cooperatively with us to reach an amicable settlement of this case without protracted litigation,” EEOC Chair Naomi C. Earp said. “We believe this is a satisfactory resolution for all parties.”

Walgreens’ CEO, Jeffrey A. Rein, said, “We are pleased to reach a resolution that is consistent with our past and future diversity and equal opportunity objectives. Our company was built on principles of fairness and equality, and we do not tolerate discrimination in any aspect of employment including store assignment, compensation and promotion opportunities. In fact, we’re a drugstore industry leader when it comes to the employment and promotion of African American managers and pharmacists.”

Private plaintiffs’ counsel, Tiffany B. Klosener of Foland, Wickens, Eisfelder, Roper & Hofer, said, “Walgreens is a rapidly growing company with lots of opportunity for its employees. We look forward to working with Walgreens to promote fair and equal employment opportunities for all employees.”

Source: http://www.eeoc.gov/press/7-12-07.html

The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 23

The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (FRCP) 23 are the rules that govern civil cases in U.S. District Courts (Federal courts). As I mentioned in a recent post, this would include civil cases filed against an employer in a class action lawsuit or with a sole complainant.

Even though federal courts are required to apply the laws of the states as rules of decision in cases where state law is in question, the federal courts almost always use the FRCP as their rules of procedure.

The FRCP contains a list of the prerequisites for filing a class action complaint. For instance, the FRCP states:

One or more members of a class may sue or be sued as representative parties on behalf of all only if (1) the class is so numerous that joinder* of all members is impracticable, (2) there are questions of law or fact common to the class, (3) the claims or defenses of the representative parties are typical of the claims or defenses of the class, and (4) the representative parties will fairly and adequately protect the interests of the class.

In other words, one or two employees filing suit against an employer can do so on behalf of all of the participants in the suit because:

1) There are a large number of participants that make individual suits impractical;
2) There are similar legal issues and facts among the participants;
3) The arguments/defenses of the representatives are similar/typical of the participants in the class action suit; and
4) The representatives will look out for the best interests of everyone involved in the class action suit in a fair and equitable manner.

The FRCP contains 86 rules, which are grouped into 13 chapters. These chapters include:

I. Scope of Rules--One Form of Action

II. Commencement of Action; Service of Process, Pleadings, Motions, and Orders

III. Pleadings and Motions

IV. Parties

V. Depositions and Discovery

VI. Trials

VII. Judgment

VIII. Provisional and Final Remedies

IX. Special Proceedings

X. District Courts and Clerks

XI. General Provisions

XII. Appendix of Forms

XIII. Supplemental Rules for Certain Admiralty and Maritime Claims

If you’re trying to find specific information about the rules governing civil lawsuits, the Cornell Law School web site contains the rules for each chapter of the FRCP. The link is: http://www.law.cornell.edu/rules/frcp/

There is also a permanent link to the FRCP in the Links section of this blog.

· Joinder is a legal term which refers to the inclusion of additional counts or additional defendants on an indictment.

Class Action Lawsuits

At one point, a former coworker and I spoke to an attorney about a potential class action lawsuit alleging workplace discrimination by a former employer. What we learned is that, depending on the size of the company and the number of Black employees, some attorneys are looking for anywhere from 20-25 participants in a class action lawsuit as the minimum number of complainants required to consider taking the case. And, an attorney may ultimately want a larger number of employees to join the class action lawsuit as it progresses.

The issue for my coworker and I was that our job site was once an independent company that was acquired by another very large organization. Much of the work both companies did not overlap. And, for almost the first two years, there wasn’t a lot of work being done between coworkers of the two newly merged companies. The site we worked at was nearly completely disconnected from the majority of employees. Our job site employed about 8 Blacks on a full-time basis and about 2 Black employees on a part-time basis out of about 125-150 employees.

We had little to no interaction with employees at the other job sites, who were part of the parent-company. So, we had no idea how Blacks at the parent-company were treated and really had no way of targeting the employees to find out what—if anything—was going on as far as race-based discrimination, etc.

This put us at a real disadvantage, as far as trying to establish systematic discrimination versus systematic discrimination at one specific location. Nevertheless, based on the low number of Black employees at our site, we couldn’t even approach staff about a class action lawsuit. We just didn’t have the numbers to retain the services of an attorney.

Think of it this way, attorneys are often looking to prove that there is a systematic problem within a company—as opposed to a hiccup or isolated incident. Showing that many employees were treated in a discriminatory fashion is much more powerful than an isolated case that is atypical of what’s going on at company.

So, if you’re thinking of pursuing a class action lawsuit against your employer, you need to speak to other Black employees to get an understanding of where they come down on whatever issue is raging at your job and if they are willing to attach themselves to a civil suit.

If not, you can still talk to an attorney about any specific race-based discrimination, retaliation or harassment that you were subjected to. You can file as an individual, just as you can file as part of a larger group in a class action lawsuit.

If you are planning to speak to an attorney about a class action lawsuit, you should definitely be ready to provide the number of total employees, the number of Black employees, and the number of employees you’ve already spoken to, who are interested or willing to participate in a class action lawsuit.

Tomorrow I will be providing information on Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23, which governs civil lawsuits.