{"id":112062,"date":"2022-12-07T13:20:42","date_gmt":"2022-12-07T21:20:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/?p=112062"},"modified":"2022-12-07T16:30:03","modified_gmt":"2022-12-08T00:30:03","slug":"judge-trims-black-longtime-da-investigators-disparate-treatment-lawsuit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/2022\/12\/07\/judge-trims-black-longtime-da-investigators-disparate-treatment-lawsuit\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge trims Black longtime DA investigator’s disparate treatment lawsuit"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>A Black investigator in the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office, who alleges she’s been the victim of harassment and discrimination in the workplace, lost a round in court when a judge pared portions of her lawsuit.<\/p>\n

During a hearing last week, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Maureen Duffy-Lewis dismissed Sgt. Karen Pewitt<\/strong>‘s causes of action for disparate treatment and discrimination on the basis of sex, race and age, as well as her retaliation claim.\u00a0The judge also ruled that Pewitt will have to shore up her claims for failure to prevent retaliation and discrimination. She was given 20 days to file an amended complaint.\u00a0Duffy-Lewis said Pewitt can proceed with her cause of action for failure to prevent harassment.<\/p>\n

According to Pewitt’s suit filed in April 2020, the Bureau of Investigation operated like a “(good old) boys club” in which it was stressed that employees would be team players and that one is a “problem” if he or she reports misconduct, sexual harassment, discrimination, retaliation or other abuses in the workplace.\u00a0Attorney Jeffrey M. Hausman, on behalf of the county, argued in his court papers that Pewitt’s allegations remain vague more than two years after she sued.<\/p>\n

“(The county) is still entirely in the dark as to what Pewitt has claimed to have happened,” Hausman stated in his court papers.<\/p>\n

Pewitt was hired into the Bureau of Investigation in February 1999, and during her time on the job, she has taken part in administrative hearings and provided input regarding lawsuits brought by office employees, as well as defendants in criminal cases, the suit states.\u00a0She worked without any problems for the first 10 years, but by 2009, she alleges she detected “an environment with workplace hostility, tension, degradation of and disrespect towards women.”\u00a0That year, Pewitt obtained a video depicting fictitious law enforcement male and female officers who believed they had won the lottery, in which some of the white women yell and disparage their boss with a pejorative term for gay people, the suit states.\u00a0She was alarmed the email went viral and that no one was held accountable, according to her suit.<\/p>\n

Pewitt alleges she was groped and inappropriately touched by another bureau employee during a work-related event in 2012, leaving her “shocked and stunned” by behavior she deemed “unwelcome and offensive.”\u00a0In another assignment in which she processed Black candidates for Social Security Administration work, Pewitt detected that a manager disfavored Black females, according to her court papers.<\/p>\n

“Over the years, she hears complaints about his discriminatory practices in the workplace,” the suit states. “She is told that white males are overheard stating, ‘We’re going to take this bureau back.”‘\u00a0Other Black employees later complained to her that management was “indifferent” toward them, according to the suit, which says Pewitt found that she worked in “a hostile work environment where harassment, discrimination and retaliation against women and against complainers” occurred.<\/p>\n

Pewitt received no support from management and was instead criticized for her job performance, denigrated and disrespected, the suit states. She alleges her complaints about the work environment were ignored and she was “subjected to multiple adverse employment actions.”<\/p>\n

–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Black investigator in the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office, who alleges she’s been the victim of harassment and discrimination in the workplace, lost a round in court when a judge pared portions of her lawsuit. During a hearing last week, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Maureen Duffy-Lewis dismissed Sgt. Karen Pewitt‘s causes of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":70,"featured_media":102089,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1499,1496],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112062"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/70"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112062"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112062\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":112068,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112062\/revisions\/112068"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}