In yet another instance of family responsibilities discrimination, a woman lawyer has filed a lawsuit against her law firm for being “treated differently by the firm after she had children.” She was asked to prepare the cases for trial for male attorneys while she suffered from low wages and benefits.
Lawyer Says She Was Shoved onto the Mommy Track
Lawsuit claims Pittsburgh law firm told her to spend more time with her kids
By G.M. Filisko
In what one expert says is a rising trend, a woman lawyer has sued her law firm for sexual discrimination alleging, among other things, that she was told she needed to spend less time at work and more with her family.
Alyson J. Kirleis filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania against her Pittsburgh-based employer. Kirleis v. Dickie, McCamey & Chilcote, No. 06 CV 1495 (Nov. 9).
"This lawsuit's a doozy," says Joan C. Williams, a professor who teaches employment law at the University of California Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco. Williams has studied cases filed by mothers against employers based on what she calls "family responsibilities discrimination," and she says the number of cases is increasing.
"There’s been a 40 percent increase in this type of case in the past 10 years," Williams says. "We’ve documented more than 800 lawsuits based on family responsibility against employers in general, and we’ve found 32 other lawsuits of this type against legal employers. Of those 32, it’s a mix of attorneys and staff, but most of the cases have been filed by attorneys."
"It certainly looks as if [family responsibility] cases are the new face of discrimination law based on the fact that they're growing so rapidly, when employment discrimination cases have fallen 23 percent, based on our research," Williams says.
But Diana J. Veilleux says, "I don’t know that I’ve seen an increase in these types of cases." Veilleux is a Washington, D.C.-based lawyer who represents both individuals who bring employment cases and government agencies that must defend employment cases. "But they’re probably being taken more seriously than they used to be taken."
Kirleis joined Dickie, McCamey & Chilcote as an associate in 1988 and eventually became a shareholder. According to the firm’s Web site, Kirleis handles medical-malpractice cases in addition to labor and employment matters.
Kirleis filed a complaint with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in March 2005, and the EEOC issued a notice of the right to sue in September. In her suit, Kirleis alleges she was treated differently by the firm after she had children, and that the firm engaged in a pattern and practice of sexual discrimination dating back years.
The suit alleges Kirleis was told "gals" in the firm would perform all the work necessary "to prepare the cases for trial for the male attorneys who would try the cases." She alleges she was "deprived of wages and benefits" and left out of social events and client outings.
"We tend to think that discrimination in this day and age is very subtle," Williams says, "but this isn’t subtle at all. We’ve discovered numbers of cases where women are told they belong at home or in a less fast-track job. Employers no longer say ‘this isn’t a suitable job for a woman,’ but it’s surprisingly common for employers to say ‘this isn’t a suitable job for a mother.’ That’s basically what the plaintiff was allegedly told here."
Veilleux noted the type of law the plaintiff and firm practice. "What struck me is that this is a law firm that does employment law, and that’s the type of law the plaintiff practices. She’s probably counseling businesses, handling sexual harassment complaints, and writing company policies."
That may make the firm’s job of defending itself harder, Williams says. "In at least one of the 32 cases [against legal employers], the judge made it very clear he was holding the law firm to a higher standard because it had an employment section and should have known better," she says. "That’s something that might give law firms cause for concern."
Dickie McCamey issued a statement attributed to James Miller, the firm’s president and CEO: "We’re disappointed that one of our shareholders, not an employee but an owner in the firm who has worked with us for 18 years and who still works at our firm, has chosen to take this course. … We do not and never have discriminated against anyone on the basis of gender or in any other way. Beyond that, and because we’re in litigation, we will not respond here to specific allegations, other than to say that we intend to defend this baseless lawsuit."
A spokesman for the firm refused an interview.
"One unique part of the case is that you have a law firm partner suing her own law firm and remaining onsite during litigation," says Keith Cunningham-Parmeter, an assistant professor at Willamette University College of Law in Salem, Ore., who teaches employment law. "It’s highly unusual to see an employee stay on board while litigation is pending."
Kirleis’ suit describes her as an employee, not a partner, saying she "has no ability to make decisions or influence decisions" at the firm. Edward B. Friedman, who represents Kirleis, says that despite the firm’s emphasis in its statement on his client’s shareholder status, Kirleis was "a shareholder in name."
Kirleis would like to continue to work at Dickie McCamey, says Friedman, who is based in Pittsburgh. He says his client sued only to change "how she’ll be treated and how other women at the firm will be treated."
Williams says that not only are family responsibility cases increasing, but they also have a better chance of winning for plaintiffs than typical sexual discrimination claims. "If you look at the larger universe of cases against all kinds of employers, [these] cases have a higher success rate—about 50 percent—than employment discrimination in general," she says.
Employers defending family responsibility cases are "losing, and losing big," Williams says. The largest recovery Williams has uncovered for such a claim was a jury verdict of $1.5 million awarded to a former deputy prosecutor.
"Unfortunately, law firms are some of the most difficult places to work for people with families," says Cunningham-Parmeter. "We’re always going to have discrimination lawsuits we’re familiar with—harassment based on race, sex, national origin and religion—but the emerging area is in family responsibilities, and it’s all based on sex stereotypes, on what roles workers are presumed to assume at the workplace and at home."
