- Originally published in the Chicago Tribune on October 22, 2004
Copyright 2004 Chicago Tribune Company
By James P. Miller, Tribune staff reporter.
R.R.
Donnelley & Sons Co. ended a protracted and bitter court fight
Wednesday when it agreed to pay $15 million to settle
race-discrimination claims linked to the commercial-printing giant's
1994 closure of a South Side plant.
The
high-profile case, which included disturbing accusations that nooses
and Ku Klux Klan costumes were used to intimidate workers, attracted
national attention when the U.S. Supreme Court stepped in earlier this
year to resolve a dispute over the statute of limitations for the
federal Civil Rights Act.
Despite the complexity of the legal issues, the claims of the roughly 600 African-American
employees were simple: Donnelley, they alleged, had systematically
discriminated against black workers through its hiring practices, in
the workplace, and even in the way it handled the shutdown of its
historic Lakeside Press facility.
In
settling the case known as Edith Jones vs. R.R. Donnelley, the Chicago
printer admitted no wrongdoing. The company has maintained throughout
the legal fight that the workers' claims are without merit.
Donnelley
said in a statement that it is "very pleased" to put the litigation
behind it and is "committed to providing a work environment in which
everyone is treated with dignity and respect."
Lead
plaintiff attorney H. Candace Gorman called Wednesday's settlement "a
significant victory" for the former Lakeside workers. "We're pleased
that after eight years of litigating this case R.R. Donnelley has
agreed to provide compensation" to the black Lakeside workers, she said.
With
Wednesday's settlement, Donnelley has paid a total of $36 million since
early 2003 to settle race-discrimination claims born of the Lakeside
shutdown.
The Jones case is the only
unresolved element in what was once a wide-ranging collection of civil
rights suits that current and former workers brought against Donnelley.
The other cases were previously settled, or resolved through a trial.
When
the suit was filed in 1996, the case drew headlines, and attracted
demonstrations at Donnelley's Loop headquarters. Rev. Jesse Jackson
criticized Donnelley's behavior while standing outside the main offices.
The
dispute dates to 1994, when Sears, Roebuck and Co. dropped its famous
"Big Book" consumer catalog. Donnelley, which printed the catalog at
the Lakeside plant, decided to close the 1,000-employee site.
Following
the closure, some older workers filed age-discrimination claims against
Donnelley, saying the shutdown was designed to hurry older workers into
retirement.
Black workers filed a separate
suit, alleging that the Lakeside plant had been a racially hostile work
environment, in which black workers were routinely given the least
desirable jobs and management failed to intervene when white workers
harassed black workers.
In one instance, a black worker said white workers threw his lunch in the garbage and then told him to eat from the trash can.
Another worker said a white supervisor told him that if
the supervisor's daughter brought home a black man, the supervisor
would kill them both.
The
discrimination did not happen only in the workplace, workers say. Their
suit alleged that after closing the plant Donnelley eventually managed
to find jobs elsewhere for 31 percent of white workers but only 1
percent of black employees.
Many black
employees also complained that the company had routinely hired them as
"temporary help," employed them steadily until they had almost compiled
the 24 consecutive months of unbroken employment needed to become
permanent workers with benefits, and then released them and started the
process over again.
"They would let me
work steady, but when I got 23 months they'd lay me off," breaking her
service and setting her back to square one, one such worker has
recalled.
In time, the litigation was expanded to include thousands of black Donnelley workers around the nation.
The
age-discrimination case went to trial in 2002, and the jury ruled in
favor of Donnelley. Then, early in 2003, Donnelley paid a relatively
modest $21 million to settle almost all of the race-discrimination
claims before the case went to trial.
The
Lakeside workers did not join in the settlement. Unlike the others,
their claim hinged on a legal issue--the statute of limitations in
civil rights cases.
Donnelley's lawyers
argued that Lakeside workers had waited too long to file their federal
civil rights claims, because Illinois law says plaintiffs must sue
within two years.
The judge hearing the
case ruled against Donnelley, and said the workers could pursue the
case. The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago reversed that
finding and agreed with Donnelley that the two-year limit applied.
In
May the Supreme Court settled the matter when it unanimously ruled that
civil rights plaintiffs can wait as long as four years before suing.