Stockton Steel will pay $1.1 million to four Pakistani-American former employees who said they were harassed because of their ethnicity and Muslim faith, under a settlement announced Wednesday by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
The employees were allegedly ridiculed during their daily prayers and called racial slurs, the EEOC said in a lawsuit it filed in federal district court.
Stockton Steel, a subsidiary of Pleasanton-based Herrick Corp., denied all charges in a consent decree Wednesday. But the company also agreed to conduct training to prevent future discrimination and create a policy guaranteeing an employee's right to request accommodations for religious needs.
"The discrimination, the things these people went through, was egregious," said Linda Ordonio-Dixon, an EEOC attorney. "They were called names, they were subjected to ridicule not only for their religious practices, but the way they were dressed."
Herrick Corp. spokesman Sam Singer said the company agreed to the settlement only to avoid expensive, time-consuming litigation.
"These incidents that were alleged simply did not occur," he said. "This lawsuit and the employees' claims of discrimination and harassment have absolutely no merit. "
But former machine operator Abdul Rehman said in a statement that employees at the Stockton steel plant "were humiliated and given the worst assignments simply because of where we were born and our religious beliefs."
Religious and national discrimination complaints filed with the EEOC have increased recently. Between October 2001 and September 2002, almost 2,600 religious discrimination charges were filed with the agency, a 21 percent increase from the same period a year before. National origin discrimination complaints rose to more than 9,000, up 13 percent.
Many of the complaints were filed after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, though the alleged harassment at Stockton Steel occurred before that, said EEOC attorney William Tamayo.
"We hope this serves as a message to employers that if there is harassment based on people's religion or national origin, they need to take prompt and corrective action," Tamayo said. "For employees, if they feel they've been discriminated against, they need to contact the EEOC right away."