Google was accused of systemic racism against Black employees in a lawsuit filed Friday. The suit alleges that Google steers Black employees to lower-paying jobs and denies them advancement opportunities due to their race.
A class-action complaint alleges that Google has a racist corporate culture. Black men make up only 4.4% of its employees, and 3% of its leadership and technology workforce.
April Curley, the plaintiff, stated that Alphabet Inc made it difficult for Blacks to work, and required them to show identification, or be interrogated by security on its Mountain View campus in California.
Google did not respond immediately to our requests for comment.
The federal court in San Jose, California filed the complaint.
The Department of Fair Employment and Housing in the state was investigating Google’s treatment of Black female workers and any discrimination at work.
Curley stated that Google hired Curley in 2014 to create an outreach program for historically Black colleges.
She claimed that her hiring was a marketing ploy. Supervisors started to denigrate her work and stereotyping her Black woman as “angry”, while passing her on for promotions.
Curley claimed that Google fired her in September 2020, after she and her coworkers had begun to work on a list containing reforms she wanted.
Curley’s lawyer Ben Crump stated in a statement that “Google claims they are looking to increase diversity. However, they were actually mistreating their Black employees.”
Crump is a civil right lawyer and also represented George Floyd’s family after he was shot to death by Derek Chauvin, a former Minneapolis police officer.
Curley’s lawsuit seeks compensation and punitive damages for former and current Black employees at Google and to restore their seniority and positions.
(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel, New York; Reuters editing and transcription by Cynthia Osterman).
