Companies ordered to pay $80,000 in Greene EEOC case
Coastal Drilling East LLC and Coastal Well Service LLC must pay more than $80,000 to a former employee who said he suffered racial abuse at the company’s site in Graysville, Greene County.
A federal jury in Pittsburgh agreed in December 2022 that Andre Pryce, who is Black, was subjected to racial harassment and a hostile work environment.
Pryce alleged in a lawsuit that he was harassed and repeatedly called the “N-word” while employed at the Greene County location, where he worked from March 2019 to January 2020. Pryce eventually resigned from his position.
In the lawsuit, Pryce said employees hung a noose in a trailer used by him and employees on two occasions, and on another occasion handed him a noose.
According to the court documents, a co-worker “tapped (Pryce) on the shoulder and said that a different co-worker had a gift for him. The employee then handed Mr. Pryce a third noose.”
Pryce’s supervisor also used racial epithets during the nine months he worked at the company, the suit claims. Pryce contended supervisors failed to stop the abuse.
The lawsuit states that the harassment began the first day he began work, and that Pryce informed his supervisor that his co-workers had used the “N-word,” but the supervisor took no action.
On at least six occasions, a co-worker walked up to Pryce and said, “Move,” followed by the “N-word,” and another employee asked why he didn’t go back to where he came from and called him the derogatory name, according to the lawsuit.
In December, Pryce was awarded $24,375 in compensatory damage for emotional distress by the jury and on Aug. 16 he was awarded an additional $56,093 in back pay and other relief.
The court also ordered a two-year permanent injunction barring the defendants from engaging in or tolerating racial harassment and requiring them to implement other measures to prevent further violations of federal law.
“Nooses and racial slurs have no place in the workplace, and construction sites are no exception,” said EEOC Chair Charlotte A. Burrows. “Unfortunately, racial harassment remains a significant barrier to entry, retention, and advancement of people of color in the construction industry.”
EEOC Philadelphia Regional Attorney Debra M. Lawrence said the jury’s verdict and resulting judgment against Coastal Drilling East LLC should serve as a warning to employers “that the EEOC and the American people will not tolerate racial harassment and other forms of race discrimination in the workplace.”
The lawsuit was initiated by the EEOC’s Pittsburgh area office.
Coastal Drilling East declined to comment on the case.
The EEOC originally filed the racial harassment case against Coastal Drilling East, then added Coastal Well Service as a defendant in the lawsuit in its capacity as a successor-in-interest to the well services division of Coastal Drilling East.