AT&T (Credit: John Disney / ALM)

Newly filed claims that an AT&T Mobility LLC policy discriminates against pregnant women are part of a wave of cases confronting alleged imbalances for female employees across professions.

Plaintiffs firm Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll jumped into the case Monday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Indiana. The lawyers filed an amended complaint that added a named plaintiff and class action allegations.

The complaint comes as companies increasingly are facing gender-based scrutiny over workplace policies and practices, including paid leave and compensation. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission this year has filed at least five lawsuits and reached three settlements against alleged pregnancy discrimination.

The ACLU partnered with Outten & Golden in March in a suit on behalf of female longshore workers challenging a Pacific Maritime Association policy that they claim discriminates against pregnant women. JPMorgan Chase & Co. and PayPal Inc. each were sued this year for alleged discrimination against pregnant employees. JPMorgan's lawyers at Ogletree, Deakins, Nash, Smoak & Stewart and the Greenberg Traurig team for PayPal dispute the claims.

“There has been greater clarity to emerge in how workplaces think about these life events,” said Kalpana Kotagal, a partner in Cohen Milstein's civil rights and employment practice group and co-lead counsel representing the plaintiffs in the case against AT&T. “We think pregnancy discrimination is on the front lines of dealing with all the different ways that women face discrimination in the workplace.”

AT&T said in a statement it is reviewing the complaint. “We do not tolerate discrimination of any kind, including for an employee's gender or pregnancy,” the statement said. Paul Hastings partner Kenneth Gage in New York, chair of the firm's workplace retaliation and whistleblower defense practice, is representing the company.

Former AT&T employees Katia Hills and Cynthia Allen allege the company's “no fault” attendance policy discriminates against pregnant women, according to the amended complaint filed by Cohen Milstein, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Indiana firm Cohen & Malad. Allen's claims were added in the amended complaint.

The policy, according to the complaint, assigns point-based demerits for late arrivals, early departures or absences and does not list pregnancy-related medical care or child care as acceptable reasons to not be penalized.

“AT&T Mobility is essentially punishing women for being pregnant,” Kotagal said. “Employers of course have every right to discipline employees who are habitually late or absent, but the law recognizes that pregnancy, like disability and other protected characteristics, can't and shouldn't be penalized in the same way.”

The complaint in Indiana court claims Hills was fired after accruing too many “points” from the system for pregnancy-related absences. Hills worked at AT&T in Elkhart, Indiana, from April 2014 to July 2015, according to the complaint. Allen worked in AT&T retail stores in New York in December 2012 and transferred to Las Vegas last year.

Allen became pregnant in 2016 and took off time because of health issues related to the pregnancy, the lawsuit claims. Once she returned from maternity leave, she was eventually terminated, according to the complaint, after she missed more days after taking her son for emergency medical care. She had allegedly racked up unexcused absences during her pregnancy as well.

The lawsuit seeks, among other things, a declaration that AT&T violated federal civil rights laws.

 

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