Racial harassment and fatal workplace violence generate novel employment discrimination claim
A shooting at the Lockheed Martin plant in Meridian, Miss. on July 8, 2003, in which an employee killed six co-workers and injured nine others before committing suicide is now being cast as the ultimate racially hostile work environment.
AP reported July 3: “Lawsuit filed in Lockheed Martin plant shooting”
A federal lawsuit filed by 47 Lockheed Martin employees and relatives of employees claims the company ignored numerous complaints that Doug Williams threatened to kill black co-workers months before a deadly plant shooting. . .
Lockheed Martin spokesman Joe Stout said in a prepared statement that the “shooting at the Meridian facility was a senseless tragedy.”
“Lockheed Martin has been cleared of responsibility for this incident by state and federal authorities and is confident that the same conclusion will be reached by the court” . . .
Among those killed, five were black and one was white. Among the wounded, three were black and five were white. Williams was white.
[so eight he shot were black and six were white; hardly evidence of racially motivated shooting, unless one assumes he deliberately aimed better when shooting black employees]
Family members have said Williams felt picked on by black co-workers and plant managers were not taking him seriously. . . Read more
Not clear from this article whether race discrimination is a theory of the case. Certainly, negligent failure to respond to threats of violence can be an independent theory of recovery without regard to racial motivation. However, the next story suggests the race discrimination theory might be raised in the lawsuit.
LA Times (AP) reported yesterday: “Agency Details Racial Tensions at Lockheed Site of 6 Slayings”
Lockheed Martin Corp. allowed a “racially charged atmosphere” to grow at one of its factories for years, culminating in a deadly shooting spree by a white worker last year, a federal agency said Monday.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission found that the company was aware of the hostile work environment in Meridian, Miss., but failed to stop it.
Doug Williams harassed black workers “through racially hostile, threatening and demeaning comments” from December 2001 until he shot 14 people July 8, 2003, according to the report. Six of the victims died, and 12 of those shot were black. Williams committed suicide.
[note the difference in the numbers compared to the last story]
The company’s inadequate response to Williams’ threats allowed the hostile environment to intensify, “culminating in the shooting of 14 individuals,” the report said. . . .
“We find that this hostile environment exists as to all African American employees employed at the Meridian, Miss., location,” the EEOC said. Read more
Perhaps a slight exaggeration to say the hostile environment created by a single severely troubled employee affected all African-American employees (I’m assuming the plant was large and he only had contact with a limited number of coworkers)
As always, it is much easier to point fingers after a tragedy like this than to determine exactly what the employer could or should have done differently.
Obviously, such complaints need to be investigated; I’m skeptical they were completely ignored.
Firing the guy might have helped save these particular people from being shot; it’s doubtful it would have made the gunman less of a threat to himself or others.
Perhaps the best bet would have been EAP or even involuntary commitment for mental health treatment, but chances are the true extent of his sickness was hidden.
Fellow employment blogger Michael P. Fitzgibbon of Toronto links here to several other related stories, including an earlier post of mine on workplace violence and some other more general workplace violence articles.
