A jury has awarded a former employee of Chipotle Mexican Grill in the District of Columbia $550,000 in total damages in a pregnancy discrimination lawsuit whose proceedings took up five years to wrap up. The former employee had claimed differential treatment and eventual firing due to her pregnancy.
"It has been five years of litigation, of being questioned and dealing with lawyers and telling a story of a very difficult period of her life-telling it and reliving it," said lawyer Christine Tschiderer, as per a report in DCist. Tschiderer is a lawyer with the Washington Lawyers' Committee.
The former Chipotle employee, Doris Garcia Hernandez, is said to be "thrilled" at winning her lawsuit against the company. She has been awarded $500,000 in punitive damages and $50,000 in compensatory damages and is reportedly expected to receive additional compensation for lost wages and lawyer's fees.
Hernandez became pregnant in 2011. Biz Journal reported as per Hernandez' suit, she informed her former manager of her pregnancy and that's when he began regulating her bathroom breaks. She had to announce that she was going to the bathroom to all employees in the Chipotle store and the manager would have to approve it first. These conditions were not required for non-pregnant employees.
The manager reportedly fired her in front of other employees in the main area of the Chipotle store a day after she left work early for a prenatal doctor's appointment. The manager had been ignoring her requests to leave early for that purpose.
Hernandez' plight inspired the Protecting Pregnant Workers Fairness Act of 2014. This mandates all employers in the District of Columbia "to provide reasonable workplace accommodations for employees whose ability to perform job duties is limited because of pregnancy, childbirth, breastfeeding, or a related medical condition." One accommodation given is for more frequent or longer bathroom breaks.
