On April 5, 2018, The Fortune Society, Inc., a not-for-profit whose mission is to support the successful reentry of formerly incarcerated individuals, and two former employees of the Target Corporation filed this class action lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. The plaintiffs sued the Target Corporation under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, alleging that Target utilized a job applicant screening process that systematically eliminated thousands of qualified African Americans and Latinos from jobs based on their race or national origin. The plaintiffs, represented by the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund and Outten & Golden, sought declaratory, injunctive, and monetary relief as well as attorneys’ fees and costs. The case was assigned to Judge Deborah A. Batts and Magistrate Judge Debra C. Freeman.

At issue in this case was Target’s use of criminal background checks to screen applicants for prior convictions, many of which are unrelated to the job sought or occurred long before the individual’s application for employment at Target. The plaintiffs claimed that the defendant’s hiring practices and procedures were unlawful under Title VII because they had a significant adverse impact upon African Americans and Latinos and because these practices were neither job-related nor consistent with business necessity.

On the same day the complaint was filed, the parties moved for preliminary approval of a class action settlement, conditional certification of a settlement class, and appointment of class counsel. The class was defined as, with some exceptions, all African-American and Latino applicants who were denied employment from a Target Stores Job due to a final adjudication on a pre-employment background check that did not clear the applicant to proceed based on their criminal history record, from the start of the class liability period on May 11, 2006, to the date of preliminary approval of the proposed settlement.

The settlement agreed to a priority hiring process for members of the class. The also agreement required Target to retain two experts in the field of industrial and organizational psychology to design, develop, and implement properly validated adjudication guidelines for the hiring of job applicants with criminal histories for hourly jobs at Target stores. These experts were to monitor compliance for the one-year settlement term. Target agreed to establish a settlement fund of $3,742,500. Two named plaintiffs were to receive up to $20,000 each, one named plaintiff was to receive $2,500, and members of the class no longer eligible for the hiring process were to receive up to $1,000 each. Cash settlement payments were limited to $1,200,000 and $1,900,000 was reserved for attorneys’ fees and costs. Target agreed to give $600,000 in donations to non-profits focused on the re-entry of formerly incarcerated individuals. The court was to retain jurisdiction over the matter to assure compliance.

On May 14, 2018, Judge Freeman approved the parties’ motion, giving the settlement agreement preliminary approval. The court did state, however, that final approval of the settlement agreement would be subject to a final hearing where members of the class could make objections to the proposed agreement. The date for this hearing is not yet set. The next status report is due September 28, 2018. The case is ongoing.

Jake Parker - 06/20/2018


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