Mother Sues Target Over Termination

CAMARILLO —  A former employee of a Camarillo Target store is suing the discount chain, saying she was wrongly fired for taking a week off to care for her sick baby.

Angela Lee, 22, alleges that Target Corp. has a “policy and practice” of discriminating against female employees who are pregnant, have recently given birth or take time off to care for ill children.

Lee’s attorney, Allen Ball, said Target’s actions violate California law, which prohibits firing female employees on the basis of pregnancy, childbirth or medical conditions. Under the law, employees are allowed to take 12 weeks off each year to care for family members or for medical leave if they work at companies with at least 50 employees and they have worked there for at least a year.

“It’s policy in the state of California to allow time for workers to . . . care for their children,” said Ball, who filed the civil suit Dec. 27 in Ventura County Superior Court. “Target didn’t do that.”

Ball said he has seen similar cases filed against Target, which also owns the Mervyn’s department store chain. But Ball declined to give details of the other suits. Target spokeswoman Patty Morris said she was aware of Lee’s lawsuit, but said the company does not comment on pending litigation. She defended the Minneapolis-based company as having a fair policy allowing for sick time and family leave.

“In many instances, our policy is as generous or more generous than federal and state law,” Morris said.

Target was named by Working Woman magazine last year as one of the nation’s 100 best companies for mothers in the work force, based on its child-care and family leave policies and on the opportunity for women to advance in the company. The magazine noted that 67% of the company’s employees were women and women held half of the 34 senior executive posts.

In an interview Thursday, Lee, an Oxnard resident, said she worked at the Target store in Camarillo for more than two years, when she became pregnant with her first child. She was a manager in the jewelry section, Lee said, and never had any attendance or disciplinary problems. Lee said she gave birth to Hailey in November 1999, and took about six weeks’ maternity leave before returning to work in the middle of January.

A few weeks later, her baby became ill. Lee said she asked her employer if she could have time off to take care of the infant, and a company representative approved the request, the suit says. After a week off, Lee told a Target supervisor on Feb. 11 that she was able to go back to work. But the company did not place her on the schedule, according to the suit.

For the next six weeks, Lee said, she called Target regularly and asked to be placed on the work calendar with no success. During that time, Lee said, nobody called her to talk about her job status or to warn her that her position was in jeopardy.

Lee said she went to the doctor’s office for a checkup in early April and was told that her medical insurance had been canceled. She called Target and learned that her employment had been terminated on March 23.

After she lost her job, she fell into debt and had to get rid of her car, Lee said. She looked for a new retail job, but it took five months before she found one. She said several stores weren’t hiring or just didn’t call her back. “For some reason, it was really hard,” she said. “I tried everywhere.”

During that time, she received unemployment checks of about $500 a month. Lee is now working as a sales clerk at Payless ShoeSource in Oxnard, but said she earns nearly $2 less per hour than at Target.

Target spokeswoman Morris said she doesn’t believe the company would fire or discipline employees for taking time off to care for their children. But disciplinary actions could be taken if employees don’t follow procedure and policy.

“If she was not within the policy guidelines, then I imagine there could be some ramifications,” Morris said.

Susan Fogel, legal director of the California Women’s Law Center in Los Angeles, said she could not comment directly on Lee’s suit because she is not familiar with the case. But cases alleging discrimination against working women are common, Fogel said. Women are often penalized in the workplace because of their child-care needs and responsibilities, she said.

“It is really disappointing that there are still companies who do not recognize how important it is to create family friendly workplaces for men and women,” Fogel said.

Locally, Target has had other problems with their employees. In 1990, a Ventura County jury awarded $5 million in damages to four former auto mechanics. The jury ruled that Target had fired the men after falsely accusing them of theft.

Lee’s lawsuit alleges she suffered humiliation from being fired in addition to her loss of earnings and benefits. The lawsuit does not state a specific amount of money being sought, but requests compensation for all out-of-pocket costs and other damages intended to punish Target.

“I never imagined I would sue someone,” Lee said. “But they did me wrong, so this is what I have to do.”