Massive Wal-Mart Sex Discrimination Class-Action Suit Facing New Legal Challenge

A huge, nationwide class-action lawsuit filed on behalf of about two million women who are former or current employees of retail giant Wal-Mart is facing a new legal challenge.

A federal appeals court in California is now considering whether to uphold the largest class-action lawsuit in United States history. The suit charges that Wal-Mart paid its female workers less and promoted them less often than male workers while promoting a discriminatory corporate culture that extended to the 3,000 Wal-Mart stores.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the largest retailer in the world, is seeking to decertify the case as a class-action lawsuit by arguing that the millions of women included in the class do not have sufficiently similar legal claims to collectively sue the corporation.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, based in San Francisco, held a hearing this week to hear from attorneys on the issue of whether the class-action suit should be allowed to proceed. A lower circuit court ruling went in favor of allowing the suit to retain class-action status and the Ninth Circuit has previously denied to appeals filed by Wal-Mart seeking to dismiss the suit.

Lawsuit Filed in 2001

The lawsuit that has now grown into the largest ever class-action case was filed in 2001 on behalf of a former Wal-Mart worker, Betty Dukes, and six other Wal-Mart employees. The women alleged that they were treated like second-class citizens by their employer. The case was then expanded to include all women who had worked at Wal-Mart since 1998 and was granted class-action status in 2004.

The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages for lost pay, plus punitive damages designed to punish Wal-Mart for discriminating against female employees and injunctive relief to prevent future discrimination and require Wal-Mart to fix the pay discrepancies and promotion unfairness.

‘A Pattern of Discrimination’

Attorneys for the plaintiffs told the federal appeals court this week there was “a pattern of discrimination” against women who worked at Wal-Mart. However, the company’s attorneys asked that the court apply a strict legal standard to the plaintiffs’ claims and ensure that they have enough in common to qualify as a class-action case.

Wal-Mart said that a national class alleging a corporate culture of discrimination is not proper, since its store managers acted with discretion when promoting workers or approving pay increases.

If the Ninth Circuit upholds its previous orders in favor of the class-action status moving forward, Wal-Mart could appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court seeking to reverse the court rulings.

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