A lawsuit filed on Friday accuses Google of systemic racial bias in opposition to Black workers, saying the search engine firm steers them to lower-level jobs, pays them much less and denies them alternatives to advance due to their race. According to a grievance in search of class-action standing, Google maintains a “racially biased corporate culture” that favours white males, the place Black folks comprise solely 4.4 p.c of workers and about 3 p.c of management and its expertise workforce.
The plaintiff, April Curley, additionally mentioned the Alphabet unit subjected Blacks to a hostile work surroundings, together with by typically requiring they present identification or be questioned by safety at its Mountain View, California campus.
Google didn’t instantly reply to requests for remark.
The grievance was filed within the federal courtroom in San Jose, California.
It got here after that state’s civil rights regulator, the Department of Fair Employment and Housing, started investigating Google’s remedy of Black feminine employees and doable discrimination of their office.
Curley mentioned Google employed her in 2014 to design an outreach program to traditionally Black schools.
She mentioned her hiring proved to be a “marketing ploy,” as supervisors started denigrating her work, stereotyping her as an “angry” Black girl and passing her over for promotions.
Curley mentioned Google fired her in September 2020 after she and her colleagues started engaged on a listing of desired reforms.
“While Google claims that they were looking to increase diversity, they were actually undervaluing, underpaying and mistreating their Black employees,” Curley’s lawyer Ben Crump mentioned in an announcement.
Crump is a civil rights lawyer who additionally represented the household of George Floyd after he was killed in May 2020 by former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin.
Curley’s lawsuit seeks to recoup compensatory and punitive damages and misplaced compensation for present and former Black workers at Google, and to revive them to their applicable positions and seniority.
The case is Curley v Google LLC, US District Court, Northern District of California, No. 22-01735.
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