Thies v. Siemens Industry, Inc.

Filing 1

COMPLAINT filed by Louis Thies; Jury Demand. Filing fee $ 350, receipt number 0752-6835021. (Attachments: # 1 Appendix Verification)(Kane, Lisa)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
EASTERN DIVISION
LOUIS THIES,

Plaintiff,
v.
SIEMENS INDUSTRY, INC.,
Defendant.

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Case No. 12 CV 1041
Honorable
Judge Presiding
Magistrate
Jury Trial Requested

COMPLAINT
NOW COMES Plaintiff, LOUIS THIES, by and through his attorneys, LISA KANE &
ASSOCIATES, and complaining of Defendant, SIEMENS INDUSTRY, INC., states as follows:
PRELIMINARY STATEMENT
1.

This is an action seeking redress for violations of rights guaranteed to Plaintiff by 42

U.S.C. § 1981. Plaintiff seeks mandatory injunctive relief and damages to redress Defendant’s
discriminatory employment practices.
JURISDICTIONAL STATEMENT
2.

Jurisdiction of this Court is invoked pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 1343(a)(3) and (4) and

28 U.S.C. § 1331 to secure protection of and to redress deprivation of rights secured by 42 U.S.C.
§ 1981. Plaintiff seeks declaratory relief pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 2201 and 2202.
VENUE
3.

Venue is proper under 28 U.S.C. § 1391 (b)(1) and (2).
PARTIES

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4.

Plaintiff, LOUIS THIES, is a fifty-seven (57) year old, Caucasian citizen of the

United States who resides in Illinois.
5.

Defendant, SIEMENS INDUSTRY, INC., is a corporation properly recognized and

sanctioned by the laws of the State of Illinois, and at all times did and continues to do business in
Illinois. Defendant is subject to the jurisdiction of the Court as an employer within the meaning of
42 U.S.C. § 2000e(b), as Defendant has continuously and does now employ more than fifteen (15)
employees and is engaged in an industry that affects commerce.
COUNT I – 42 U.S.C. § 1981 – RACE DISCRIMINATION
6.

Paragraphs one (1) through five (5) are incorporated by reference as if fully set forth

7.

Plaintiff, a fifty-seven (57) year old Caucasian male, began working for Flender

herein.

(which was subsequently acquired by Defendant) in November 1988, and worked continuously for
Defendant until his employment was terminated for pretextual reasons on or about January 17, 2012.
8.

Throughout his more than twenty-three (23) years of employment with Defendant,

Plaintiff has performed to Defendant’s reasonable and legitimate expectations at all times, as
evidenced by the longevity of Plaintiff’s employment with Defendant, his receipt of several meritbased raises and promotions, and his consistently positive performance reviews. Any assertion to
the contrary is pretext for race discrimination.
9.

Despite Plaintiff’s exceptional record as an employee of Defendant, Plaintiff’s work

environment began deteriorating in early 2010, when Victor Moran, a thirty-one (31) year old
Hispanic male, became Plaintiff’s direct supervisor.

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10.

Shortly after Mr. Moran became Plaintiff’s direct supervisor, it became clear that Mr.

Moran favored the non-Caucasian employees under his supervision, as Mr. Moran treated Plaintiff’s
otherwise similarly situated, Hispanic coworkers, including but not limited to Epi Ramirez, Claudio
Quinones, Caesar Sanchez, Caesar Chavez and Miguel, more favorably with respect to the terms and
conditions of their employment.
11.

Specifically, Mr. Moran invariably spoke to Plaintiff in a hostile and antagonistic

manner, in stark contrast to the cordial and respectful manner in which he interacted with
subordinate Hispanic employees under his supervision.
12.

Likewise, Mr. Moran would begin speaking in Spanish with Hispanic employees

under his supervision whenever Plaintiff was present, in order to exclude Plaintiff from conversation
and otherwise make Plaintiff feel unwelcome by his Hispanic coworkers.
13.

Further, Mr. Moran would unreasonably criticize Plaintiff’s work performance,

despite the fact Plaintiff’s work performance had always been considered exemplary by Defendant
and his other supervisors.
14.

Given the obvious disparity between the manner in which Mr. Moran treated Hispanic

and Caucasian employees under his supervision, Plaintiff complained to Mr. Moran’s supervisor,
Jacob Schiff, on multiple occasions that Mr. Moran was treating the Hispanic employees under his
supervision more favorably than the Caucasian employees under his supervision, including Plaintiff.
15.

However, neither Defendant nor Mr. Schiff took any action to investigate or address

Plaintiff’s complaints of race discrimination, and Mr. Moran continued to treat otherwise similarly
situated, Hispanic employees under his supervision more favorably than Plaintiff.

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16.

Rather making an effort to understand or address Plaintiff’s complaints of race

discrimination, Mr. Moran concocted a scheme that would allow him to fabricate a record to
terminate Plaintiff’s employment based on pretextual reasons as a result of Plaintiff’s complaints of
race discrimination.
17.

In this regard, Plaintiff has worked as a Tester throughout the duration of his

employment under Victor Moran.
18.

As a Tester, Plaintiff was responsible for ensuring the quality of Defendant’s products

by assuring that said products met Defendant’s quality assurance standards before being released to
the market.
19.

Given his knowledge of Plaintiff’s responsibilities with respect to quality assurance,

Victor Moran intentionally placed Plaintiff into situations where Plaintiff was forced between
making two choices, each of which would further Mr. Moran’s plan to fabricate a record to terminate
Plaintiff’s employment based on pretextual reasons.
20.

Specifically, Mr. Moran began placing unreasonable pressure on Plaintiff any time

Plaintiff would take issue with the quality of any product being produced by Mr. Moran’s assembly
workers.
21.

Even though Plaintiff was simply performing his duties with respect to ensuring the

quality of Defendant’s products, Mr. Moran capitalized upon Plaintiff’s dedication to enforcing
Defendant’s quality standards by arbitrarily disputing Plaintiff’s decisions with regard to the
acceptance and rejection of Defendant’s products based on the quality of the same.
22.

In this regard, whenever Plaintiff would identify a manufactured product as not

meeting Defendant’s quality standards, Mr. Moran would stubbornly argue that the product was of
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satisfactory quality, despite Mr. Moran’s lack of knowledge regarding Defendant’s quality assurance
standards.
23.

As a result, Plaintiff was placed in the untenable position of being forced to choose

between arguing with his direct supervisor, Mr. Moran, and risk being disciplined for the same, or
disregard his quality assurance responsibilities and submit to Mr. Moran’s demands to allow substandard products to be released to the market, thereby subjecting Plaintiff to likely performancerelated discipline.
24.

Given Plaintiff’s adherence to Defendant’s quality assurance standards, Plaintiff

invariably chose to enforce his quality assurance responsibilities and object to Mr. Moran’s pressures
to simply “get [defective and/or sub-standard products] out the door.”
25.

In turn, Mr. Moran willfully antagonized Plaintiff regarding Plaintiff’s decisions to

enforce Defendant’s quality assurance standards, which resulted in Mr. Moran issuing Plaintiff a
series of pretextual write-ups between May 26, 2010 and July 6, 2011, even though Plaintiff had
never been issued any written disciplinary actions during his more than twenty (20) years of
employment with Defendant.
26.

To that effect, Mr. Moran unjustifiably insulted Plaintiff’s intelligence, questioned

Plaintiff’s decision-making abilities, and otherwise antagonized Plaintiff for performing the duties
of his position in order to provoke Plaintiff.
27.

As a result, Plaintiff was written up on three (3) separate occasions for arguing with

Mr. Moran regarding Plaintiff’s decision to reject defective and/or sub-standard units, even though
Plaintiff could invariably prove that he was correct in standing by his decisions to reject such
defective and/or sub-standard units.
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28.

Further, Mr. Moran usurped Defendant’s progressive discipline policy, by

immediately giving Plaintiff a written warning, without first giving Plaintiff a verbal warning as
required by Defendant’s policy.
29.

Accordingly, Plaintiff contacted Defendant’s Chief Executive Officer, Arnot Kunt,

after receiving his third written warning in July 2011, regarding the fact Victor Moran was trying to
fabricate a record to terminate Plaintiff’s employment based on pretextual reasons.
30.

Mr. Kunt advised Plaintiff that he was aware that Mr. Moran wanted to terminate

Plaintiff’s employment, but Mr. Kunt assured Plaintiff that his employment was not going to be
terminated.
31.

Although Plaintiff’s conversation with Mr. Kunt delayed Mr. Moran’s plan to

terminate Plaintiff’s employment based on pretextual reasons, Mr. Moran continued his pattern of
ostracizing Plaintiff from his Hispanic coworkers by speaking in Spanish with said individuals,
excluding Plaintiff from group meetings and instruction sessions, and attempting to instigate
altercations with Plaintiff by being unreasonably critical of Plaintiff’s work performance.
32.

Having laid the groundwork for Plaintiff’s pretextual termination between May 2010

and July 2011, Mr. Moran effectuated his plan by instigating an altercation with Plaintiff in January
2012.
33.

At said time, Mr. Moran accused Plaintiff of committing an error regarding Plaintiff’s

rejection of defective units. When Plaintiff attempted to respond with his rationale for rejecting the
defective units, Mr. Moran threatened and continued to antagonize Plaintiff.

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34.

Accordingly, Plaintiff responded that it was “bullshit” that Mr. Moran was insisting

that Plaintiff allow sub-standard products to be released to the market, in derogation of Plaintiff’s
employment duties.
35.

Further, Plaintiff was able to justify the fact that he had properly rejected the

aforementioned defective units, as his decision was corroborated by an engineer, Jin Parnythian
(“J.P.”).
36.

Nonetheless, Mr. Moran accused Plaintiff of acting in a rude and disrespectful

manner, notwithstanding Moran’s attempts to provoke Plaintiff with his pointed and unfounded
criticism, which resulted in Plaintiff’s employment being terminated on January 17, 2012, based on
pretextual reasons, as intended by Mr. Moran.
37.

Given Mr. Moran’s discriminatory termination of Plaintiff’s employment, Plaintiff

immediately contacted and left a message for Defendant’s Chief Executive Officer, Arnot Kunt, as
Mr. Kunt was aware of Mr. Moran’s animus towards Plaintiff.
38.

However, approximately one week later, Mr. Kunt contacted Plaintiff and advised

Plaintiff that Defendant was not willing to reconsider the termination of Plaintiff’s employment.
39.

Immediately thereafter, Plaintiff was replaced in his position by a twenty-four (24)

year old individual whom Plaintiff had been directed to train prior to the termination of his
employment.
40.

At all times relevant hereto, Plaintiff’s work performance and conduct was as good

or better than similarly-situated, non-Caucasian employees who were not discharged for
discriminatory reasons.

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41.

As a result, Plaintiff was treated less favorably by Defendant than otherwise similarly-

situated, non-Caucasian employees, and his employment was terminated by Defendant for pretextual
reasons.
42.

The aforementioned acts and omissions of Defendant constitute intentional

discrimination against Plaintiff on the basis of his race, Caucasian, and have deprived Plaintiff the
enjoyment of all benefits, privileges, terms, and conditions of his employment relationship in
violation of 42 U.S.C. § 1981.
43.

As a direct and proximate result of the above alleged willful and reckless acts or

omissions of Defendant, Plaintiff has suffered damages, including but not limited to, lost and
foregone wages and benefits, and physical and emotional harm.
PRAYER FOR RELIEF
WHEREFORE, Plaintiff, LOUIS THIES, prays for judgment against Defendant and
respectfully requests that this Court:
A.

Declare the conduct of Defendant to be in violation of rights guaranteed to Plaintiff

under appropriate federal law;
B.

Grant a permanent injunction restraining Defendant, its officers, successors, assigns,

and all persons in active concert or participation with them, from engaging in any employment
practices that unlawfully discriminates on the basis of race;
C.

Order Defendant to make whole LOUIS THIES by providing affirmative relief

necessary to eradicate the effects of the Defendant’s unlawful practices;
D.

Order Defendant to pay lost, foregone, and future wages to LOUIS THIES;

E.

Grant Plaintiff any consequential, compensatory, punitive, and other damages that
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the Court may deem appropriate;
F.

Grant Plaintiff his attorney’s fees, costs, and disbursements; and

G.

Grant Plaintiff such further relief as the Court deems necessary and proper in the

public interest.
JURY TRIAL DEMAND
44.

Plaintiff requests a jury trial on all issues of fact and law raised by the allegations in

this Complaint.
Respectfully Submitted,
LOUIS THIES, Plaintiff
By: s/ Lisa Kane
Lisa Kane, Attorney for Plaintiff
Lisa Kane & Associates
141 West Jackson Boulevard, Suite 3620
Chicago, Illinois 60604
[phone]
Attorney Code No. 06203093

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