The taxpayers of Fulton County, Ga. have just learned how much
discrimination can hurt. Last year, a jury demanded the county pay a
former official $300,000 for passing him over for a promotion in favor
of a black woman. And this week, a judge added another $1.18 million to
the total, reports WSB-TV.
"Endurance, pain, frustration, sadness, it's just been six years of your
life consumed with this issue," Doug Carl (pictured) told the TV
station about the the case.
As AOL Jobs reported last year,
Carl was the county's deputy director of human services, when his boss
-- a black woman -- stepped down. He was already serving as acting
director, when he applied to officially take her job in April 2007.
After two rounds of panel interviews, he was denied the job in favor of a
black woman who hadn't been interviewed, according to the lawsuit he
filed in July that year. Carl retired in 2010, after his position was
eliminated.
Fulton County Manager Tom Andrews, one of the defendants, admitted
during the trial that he called employees "black marbles" and "white
marbles" in making personnel decisions. County Commissioner Emma Darnell
also allegedly made racially charged remarks, supposedly telling a
deputy county manager that she had "too many white boys' in human
services, and that the new director should be black and female.
Darnell denied making such a statement, however, and no witness testified to hearing those comments firsthand.
"The only reason Mr. Carl alleges that race played a part in the
selection process is because the person chosen happened to be an
African-American female," Ware said in his statement, reported by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
"Mr. Carl was incredulous that a black woman would be chosen over him
and thus decided to accuse the county of a race-based decision."
Fulton County has appealed last year's ruling, so no money has yet changed hands.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964, which outlaws race, sex and various other kinds of discrimination, was initially intended to end the suppression of the black vote, as well as racial segregation in schools, workplaces and public facilities. But increasing numbers of white men claim that they have become victims of racial and sex bias, and are demanding justice under the law.
This week, the former chancellor of Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne, a white man, sued the school, alleging gender discrimination. He claims he is the only high-level administrator to be denied an exemption from the university's mandatory retirement age, so that the school could appoint a woman to his job -- a woman who is just a year younger.
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