The state of Nevada has agreed to settle a federal civil rights lawsuit by paying $125,000 to a former state forestry dispatcher who was fired after telling her supervisors that she was pregnant. Tawnya Meyer, 32, was fired in March 2007, and is now working in Oregon. Her case was taken up by the U.S. Department of Justice as a civil rights violation, and last May the agency filed a federal lawsuit against the Nevada Division of Forestry. Yesterday, the state’s Board of Examiners agreed to settle the lawsuit, after being told by the state attorney general’s office that Meyer could receive up to $374,000 if the case went to trial and the jury found for the plaintiff. According to the lawsuit, Meyer notified her supervisor that she was pregnant, and would need to be off from work during the busy summer fire season. Shortly after, her doctor ordered her to take leave. During that leave, the DOJ alleged that her supervisor and two fire managers met and decided to fire Meyer because of her pregnancy, and to replace her with a non-pregnant employee. The DOJ noted that such an action is clearly illegal under federal civil rights laws. The lawsuit also alleged that the supervisors and another dispatcher made inappropriate remarks to Meyer about her pregnancy in the period before she was fired. Read the DOJ’s May announcement of the lawsuit filing, information about unlawful discrimination involving pregnancy in the workplace here, a news account of the settlement, and download (pdf) the federal lawsuit court documents here.
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