Harassment Suit by Disabled Man : * Employment: Plaintiff, who has cerebral palsy, says he was forced to quit because co-workers at a Taco Bell persistently teased and laughed at him.

A disabled man has sued Taco Bell, claiming that he was harassed by co-workers at a Covina franchise of the fast-food chain while a supervisor did nothing to stop it.

The plaintiff, Jon Anthony Soto, 32, who lives in Covina with his parents, was born with cerebral palsy, which has left him mentally impaired and causes his body to shake uncontrollably, the suit said.

Soto said he worked part time as a busboy for almost two years at the restaurant on Citrus Avenue, his first “real” job after completing a training workshop for people with disabilities.

Soto’s mother, Jean Soto, said her son often came home upset after being teased and laughed at by workers, who sometimes pushed him to the restaurant floor.

The woman said she refused to let her son go back to work after he came home crying June 8, 1990. Soto told her that his teen-age co-workers hid his sweater and later threatened to burn it. After he cried and begged for the sweater, the teen-agers ran outside and threw it to the ground. Soto retrieved the sweater and left.

“It tore me up to see a man crying,” Jean Soto recalled.

After officials did nothing about the allegations, Soto, aided by his sister, Bonnie Tinker, sued Taco Bell alleging wrongful termination, discrimination and harassment.

Soto’s attorney, Brian Kellogg, said a wrongful termination claim is justified because Taco Bell breached its employment agreement by allegedly allowing employees to harass Soto, thereby forcing him to resign because the conditions were intolerable.

The complaint, filed in Pomona Superior Court in January, names as defendants Taco Bell Corp.; Pepsico Inc., owner of Taco Bell; Triple T Foods Inc., owner of the Covina franchise, and Jim Nolan, a former manager at the location.

The complaint seeks unspecified punitive damages, back wages, court costs and attorney fees.

Tinker, a 34-year-old homemaker, said that ever since her brother left Taco Bell, he has been afraid to look for another job.

“The lawsuit is intended to send a message that there’s obviously blatant discrimination everywhere and (that) it has to be stopped,” Tinker said.

Triple T owner Tom Lucus said, “I don’t know how the lawsuit came about. It’s ridiculous.”. When asked to comment further on the case, he said, “My attorney advised me not to talk (about it),” and hung up the telephone.

Mark Ishikawa, Taco Bell’s attorney, filed a response last month denying the allegations, stating that “the employment was terminable at will by the employer . . . due to plaintiff’s willful breach of duty in the course of his employment, and/or habitual neglect of his duties, and/or continued incapacity to perform his duties.”

The case has entered the discovery phrase, which means that the attorneys are taking depositions and answering questionnaires, said Kellogg. He said he will try to get a jury trial scheduled in the next two years.

The incidents began immediately after he was hired June 20, 1988, Soto said in an interview at Tinker’s home in Pasadena.

“They called me names, bad names, things you couldn’t print,” he said. “They mimicked my speech. I don’t like that.”

Soto, who speaks slowly and slurs his words, said Nolan, the former manager, laughed while the teen-agers teased and mimicked him. Nolan told him to “ignore it,” he said.

Nolan could not be reached for comment.

No employees were ever reprimanded for their actions, Tinker alleged.

After she called Taco Bell headquarters to tell them about the harassment, another manager at the Covina franchise scolded her brother for complaining, Tinker said.

“I thought things would change for the better,” Soto said. “I tried to plead with them to let me do my work and don’t bother me.”