A Florida delivery service worker won the anti-discrimination lawsuit he filed against his former employer who terminated him for refusing to work on Sundays so he can go to church.
The Christian Post reported that the unnamed employee will receive $50,000 in relief from his former employer, the Tampa Bay Delivery Service, which is one of Amazon's couriers for Florida. The Tampa Bay Delivery Service was also ordered by the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to make changes to its workplace environment in settlement of the religious discrimination lawsuit.
According to the statement released by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on January 27, the unnamed employee has previously requested to take Sundays off so he can attend worship services in his church. Yet the company overlooked the request and scheduled him on one Sunday, such that the employee reminded them through his dispatcher regarding his Sunday duties. The company then terminated him on account of failure to show up for work for the said Sunday shift.
The unnamed employee brought the matter to the EEOC who then filed the lawsuit on his behalf in the United States District Court of the Florida Middle District last September.
The EEOC, in line with its decision siding with the employee, cited the 1964 Civil Rights Act Title VII that particularly "prohibits discrimination based on religion and requires employers to reasonably accommodate an applicant's or employee's sincerely held religious beliefs unless it would pose an undue hardship."
In addition, the EEOC required Tampa Bay Delivery Service to provide staff training on religious discrimination and the designation of a "religious accommodation coordinator" to handle such concerns so as to avoid a future incident from happening.
EEOC Miami District Regional Attorney Robert Weisberg pointed out that Tampa Bay Delivery Service's cooperativeness in line with the case is also necessary to prevent employees from having a similar experience.
"We commend Tampa Bay Delivery Service for working collaboratively with EEOC to resolve this lawsuit. The company's willingness to address EEOC's concerns will help in preventing future employees from being forced to choose between employment and a religious belief," Weisberg said.
In line with this, EEOC Tampa Field Office Director Evangeline Hawthorne invited other employers in the Tampa Bay Area to ensure they adhere to policies on "religious accommodation" such as that stated in the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
"We encourage other employers to follow Tampa Bay Delivery Service's lead and review their religious accommodation policies and practices to ensure that workers are not denied opportunities due to their religious beliefs," Hawthorne stressed.
A similar case happened to Marie Jean Pierre in 2019 when she received $21 million in punitive damages for being terminated for refusing to work on Sundays due to her "love" and out of "honor" for God. Pierre, a 60-year-old immigrant from Haiti, worked in Miami's Conrad Hotel from 2006 until 2016 and would ask co-workers to cover for her on Sundays in exchange of trading workdays. The hotel reasoned "unexcused absences" along with negligence and misconduct for terminating Pierre.
