Employer ordered to pay delivery driver fired for requesting pregnancy accommodation
An employer who fired a delivery driver after she said she could not do heavy lifting during her pregnancy has been ordered to pay her back wages and damages, the state Attorney General’s Office said.
Sarai Alhasawi was fired when she asked for accommodation during her pregnancy in 2018.
Attorney General Bob Ferguson’s office sued, and on Thursday Pierce County Superior Court Judge Stanley Rumbaugh ordered Colmar Inc. and DB Delivery and owner Collin Heacox to pay her $41,672.36.
The lawsuit said the companies are related and that they have terminals in DuPont and Fife. Alhasawi started working as a delivery driver, delivering packages, in 2016.
According to the lawsuit:
When she told a manager she could not safely lift heavy items on her route because she was pregnant, the manager said other pregnant workers had done their routes without accommodation. The manager fired her via text message and said in part: “Don’t give me that crap that you can’t work because you’re pregnant. Either you don’t want to or you want to but it doesn’t matter anymore because you’re no longer employed with us.”
Alhasawi and her family stayed with relatives across the state after she lost the job.
Last month the court found the defendants violated the Washington Law Against Discrimination and the state’s 2017 “Healthy Starts Act.”
The case is the first Ferguson’s office has taken to trial under the Healthy Starts Act. The law says pregnant employees must be given accommodations, such as additional restroom breaks and having lifting limited to 17 pounds or less.
“A pregnant employee does not have to choose between her job and her health,” Ferguson said in a press release. The “ruling communicates to employers around the state that my office will ensure pregnant employees are protected.”
In their trial brief, the defendants, “a small subcontractor to the Federal Express Corporation,” denied discriminating against any employees.
They argued in part that the new law “does not require an employer to create additional employment that the employer would not have otherwise created. ... To do so would create a financial hardship on this business as its margins are low and Colmar does not control the Federal Express supply chain.”
In addition to the penalties, Colmar and DB Delivery will need to give employees information about the law and get training about employees’ rights.
