On September 29, 2000 the EEOC filed this complaint against Celanese Acetate LLC. in the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina. It was assigned to Judge Cameron M. Currie. The EEOC alleged that the defendant discriminated against employees on the basis of race, in violation of Section 706(f) of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Section 102 of the Civil Rights Act of 1991. A Black employee of that company, represented by private counsel, intervened pursuant to the same statutes and South Carolina common law on February 5, 2001, and the motion was granted on February 20. We don't have access to the pleadings in this case and as such, we don't have more specific information about the plaintiff's allegations.

After some litigation over discovery issues, which produced a May 14, 2001 order by the assigned Magistrate Judge Bristow Marchant, the defendants moved for summary judgment on September 28, 2001. However, before the court ruled, the parties entered into a consent decree on December 3, 2001.

The agreement provided that the defendant pay the individual plaintiff $75,000 and take various measures to prevent racial discrimination in its Rock Hill, South Carolina facility, including: trainings on federal anti-discrimination law, modifications to the company’s processes for investigating complaints of harassment, posting notices of the consent decree in facilities, and reporting of discrimination complaints and other monitoring by EEOC. The defendant also agreed to pay the individual plaintiff’s attorneys’ fees. The consent decree ran for three years, expiring on December 3, 2004. There have been no updates on the docket since that date and the case is now closed.

Jonah Hudson-Erdman - 09/29/2020


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