Employment — discrimination

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United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit

Civil

Employment — discrimination

Even though an employee stole from her employer, summary judgment was improperly granted to the employer on her discrimination claim, where the employer only warned, but did not fire, another employee who stole from it.

“Perez brought suit under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for gender and national origin discrimination. The district court granted summary judgment in Thorntons’ favor. If Perez discounted the candy she ‘bought’ without permission, her behavior was wrongful, and a jury might well find that her firing was not tainted by unlawful bias. In reviewing a grant of summary judgment, however, we must give Perez the benefit of conflicts in the evidence and any reasonable inferences in her favor. In that light, a jury could find that Perez’s wrongdoing for which she was fired was comparable to the wrongdoing of her non-Hispanic male supervisor, and that the supervisor’s animus against women and Hispanics tainted the decision to fire her. Based on this record, a jury must sort out the conflicting evidence and decide why Thorntons chose to treat arguably similar wrongdoing so differently. Accordingly, we reverse the district court’s judgment and remand for further proceedings.”

Reversed and Remanded.

12-3669 Perez v. Thorntons, Inc.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Manning, J., Hamilton, J.