Lawsuit Accuses Google of Being Biased Against Black Employees
The tech giant is being sued for allegedly maintaining a "racially biased corporate culture."
Google is being sued for allegedly maintaining a "racially biased corporate culture" by a person it brought on in 2014 to increase hiring from historically black colleges and universities. The complaint, filed in a San Jose, California, federal court and seeking class-action status, alleges that Google discriminates against Black employees and favors white men and says Black workers make up just 4.4% of employees, according to Reuters.
The plaintiff, April Curley, alleges she was hired as a "marketing ploy" and that Google soon began stereotyping her as an "angry" Black woman and disregarding her for promotions, the news outlet said.
Google didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.
Curley alleges the company fired her in September 2020 after she and her colleagues started working on a list of reforms.
Curley is being represented by Ben Crump, the lawyer who represented the family of George Floyd after Floyd was killed by former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin in May 2020.
"While Google claims that they were looking to increase diversity, they were actually undervaluing, underpaying and mistreating their Black employees," Crump said in a statement to Reuters.
The lawsuit seeks punitive damages and to recoup lost compensation for current and former Black employees at Google, and to restore their positions.