Tesla lost in court against a black worker of one of the branded factories. Now the company must pay Owen Dias almost 137 million dollars. The federal jury jury decided that the Wednesday in which he worked was racially hostile, reports Bloomberg. Tesla should pay $ 130 million fine and 6.9 million dollars per moral damage.
Diaz hired in 2015 through the recruitment agency. He told that he was subjected to racist ridicule. Due to the hostile environment in the workplace, he lost appetite and sleep. “Sometimes I just sat on the stairs and cried,” Diaz admitted. Professor of Law in Berkeley Law David Oppenheimer called compensation for the largest payment among all cases of racial discrimination in the employment of individuals.
In Tesla, after the announcement of the court decision, noted that the problem of racism in the company was exaggerated. Three witnesses (all of them, unlike Diaz, enter the staff of Tesla) confirmed that they had repeatedly heard of the general statements due to race. However, employees added that such words although they are unacceptable in the workplace, but they used “in a friendly” and mainly African-American colleagues.
Lawyers believe that the decision with regard to Tesla will create a court precedent and will encourage activists to fight for their rights. At the same time, a collective claim was filed against the company with a similar accusation in racism. In addition, in August, the court first obliged Tesla to pay another former employee of Melvin Berry one million dollars due to the fact that in the workplace two of the higher employees called the man “Niger”, and because of the systematic harassment, he was forced to quit.