Court allows state to proceed with disability bias case

A federal court in Sacramento ruled that the California Civil Rights Department can proceed with its disability discrimination suit against Grimmway Farms, and both parties have until Monday to determine whether to participate in mediation or select dates for trial.

In a Sept. 22 order, the U.S. District Court for Eastern California rejected Grimmway’s request to dismiss the class-style allegations and denied most of its summary judgment motions. The court emphasized that whether the company engaged in a pattern or practice of disability discrimination is a matter for a judge or jury to decide.

On Tuesday, the court granted a joint stipulation extending the deadline for the parties to propose dates for a final pretrial conference and trial and giving them time to consider mediation.

The Civil Rights Department filed a discrimination complaint in 2021 on behalf of about 600 workers who were referred to the farm’s interactive process section between 2016 and March 1, 2024. The complaint alleges that Bakersfield-based Grimmway violated the federal Americans with Disabilities Act and California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act by steering into unpaid leave nearly every worker referred to the interactive process section during this period, including 199 referred by the company’s workers’ compensation department.

The department said Grimmway’s record shows little to no effort to find alternative assignments for those who can work with accommodations unless they’re receiving workers compensation benefits.

“Generally, if an employee is injured on the job and qualifies for workers compensation benefits, but also able to work with accommodation, Grimmway will assign the worker alternative duties,” the department alleged. “When the employee’s workers compensation benefits are exhausted, Grimmway transfers the employee to what it calls ‘interactive process leave’ — which is unpaid. The reasonable accommodations cease, and the employee is terminated after weeks of ‘interactive process leave.’”

The court in September rejected the argument that the state can’t allege a pattern or practice of retaliation under the ADA or FEHA because it can’t prove that workers were subjected to an adverse employment action.

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