Court Upholds $3-Million Award in Job Bias Case

A state appeals court upheld nearly $3 million in damages for a Muslim who said he was harassed and ridiculed by co-workers at United Airlines, forced to clean a toilet with his hands and fired on fabricated charges.

An Alameda County Superior Court jury was entitled to believe Ahmad Abu-Aziz’s version of the disputed facts and find that he had been a victim of discrimination because of his religion and Jordanian national origin, said the 1st District Court of Appeal in a ruling made public Wednesday.

Abu-Aziz, who worked four months for United cleaning airplane interiors at Oakland International Airport in 1994-95, was awarded $246,000 for economic losses, $50,000 for emotional distress and $2.67 million in punitive damages.

He was then studying to be a mechanic and hoped to become one at United, but now works as a mechanic for Alaska Airlines in the San Francisco Bay Area, said his lawyer, John Riley.

The ruling could be appealed to the state Supreme Court.

According to Abu-Aziz’s testimony, Dave Gunn, leader of his work team, made fun of his name at their first meeting in October 1994, singled him out for the job of cleaning all airplane lavatories, and ordered him to clean a toilet with his hands rather than a brush.

He said Gunn, in front of other workers, joked about veiled Arab women driving cars and asked how many wives he had. Abu-Aziz also said a flight attendant laughingly told him that he looked like a terrorist.

When he complained to his supervisor, Tracy Bryant, in December 1994, Abu-Aziz said, she told him that he wasn’t a “team player” and suggested that he keep a low profile. She met the next day with him and Gunn, accepted Gunn’s word that he had been joking and told them to shake hands, Abu-Aziz said.

Bryant testified that Abu-Aziz had never complained about discrimination.

He was fired after three women on the cleaning crew held a party on a plane and drank wine in January 1995.

Two women gave statements to Geraldine Jodi Taylor, the general manager of customer service, admitting misconduct and saying nothing about Abu-Aziz. But Taylor testified that another worker, one of Abu-Aziz’s alleged harassers, accused him of involvement, although her notes of their interview contained no such accusation.

Abu-Aziz said the worker, Jeff Crimmins, later asked him to hide a bottle of tequila in his locker. He refused, and later saw indications that the lockers had been searched.

After receiving written statements from Crimmins, Gunn and two other workers accusing Abu-Aziz of drinking on the job and stealing company property, Taylor told Abu-Aziz of the charges at a meeting in February 1995 and fired him, along with the three women.

The appeals court said the evidence justified the jury’s conclusion that Abu-Aziz suffered severe or pervasive harassment.