Landmark Dodge, Inc., and Landmark South, Inc. (Landmark Dodge), the owners of automobile dealerships in Independence, Missouri and formerly in Belton, Missouri, will pay $275,000 and furnish other relief to settle a U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) lawsuit, the federal agency announced.
The EEOC’s suit alleged Landmark Dodge had a policy of refusing to hire women for sales jobs and men for office jobs, and that the company retaliated against two human resources employees who opposed the practice.
According to the suit, Landmark Dodge’s owner told two new human resources employees that he believed women don’t make good salespeople and men don’t work well in the office. The two HR employees quickly discovered the company’s hiring managers were in fact refusing to hire women for sales positions and men for certain office positions.
When the HR employees opposed the practice and insisted on consideration of all qualified job applicants regardless of sex, Landmark Dodge retaliated against them by making their work environment increasingly hostile and forced them to quit. Company records showed that from the fall of 2017 through at least April 2019, Landmark Dodge hired no women for sales positions and no men for the office jobs. During the lawsuit, the EEOC identified more than a dozen women and men whom Landmark Dodge refused to hire because of their sex.
The company’s alleged conduct violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits workplace discrimination based on sex, including the use of sex-based preferences in hiring decisions, as well as retaliation for opposing sex discrimination.
Source: EEOC
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