The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed yesterday in federal court a discrimination lawsuit against garment manufacturer Rifu Apparel Corp. for allegedly not renewing the employment contracts of four female workers who got pregnant.
Saipan Tribune tried to reach Rifu Apparel for comment, but a staff said their president, Mr. Choi, is off island.
EEOC, through its regional attorney Anna Y. Park, asked for a jury trial.
The commission asked the U.S. District Court for the NMI to issue a permanent injunction stopping Rifu and its officers or representatives from engaging in discrimination on the basis of pregnancy and any other employment practice that discriminates on the basis of sex.
EEOC asked the court to order Rifu to institute and carry out policies, practices, and programs that provide equal employment opportunities for women, and which eradicate the effects of its alleged unlawful employment practices.
The plaintiff asked the court to make whole the workers by providing compensation for past and future pecuniary losses, including medical expenses not paid by the employers, for emotional pain and suffering, inconvenience, loss of enjoyment of life, and humiliation.
Park alleged that Ou He Qian, Xiao Yan Chen, Peng Ying Lu, and Lian Qin Li were terminated and or discriminated against by Rifu on the basis of their gender (female) and their pregnancies.
Park said that since September 2004, Rifu has engaged in unlawful employment practices at its Saipan facility by failing to renew the employment contracts of the four women and the temporary work authorization contract of Lu because they became pregnant.
Park said Rifu deprived the workers and similarly situated individuals of employment benefits given to employees not affected by pregnancy.
“The unlawful practices complained of were done with malice or with reckless indifference to the federally protected rights of the charging parties and other similarly situated individuals who were discriminated against because they became pregnant,” Park said.
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