A bronze statue of Lady Justice holding scales is displayed indoors.
HARRISBURG, Pa. – A Black woman who claims she was the target of age and racial discrimination in the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office is entitled to more than $200,000, a federal judge has ruled.
Judge Joseph Saporito ruled earlier this year that Anita Robinson should recover back and front pay, plus compensatory damages, after accusing the AG’s office of replacing her with a much younger employee after 21 years at work. She was 60 years old when she sued the office in 2022.
A human resources analyst, she was the first point of contact for equal employment opportunity matters and served several other roles. She was fired in 2021 as part of a restructuring of the Human Resources division.
But the OAG had posted a job opening for a Human Resource Analyst III position, and a younger woman was hired. Judge Saporito found testimony from OAG employees credible as to the need for an HR restructuring but not to why Robinson was fired instead of being placed in the new HR analyst position.
“(D)espite its contentions that it had concerns about the plaintiff’s work performance, OAG cannot reconcile those claims with the fact that the plaintiff received either ‘Satisfactory’ or ‘Commendable’ ratings through her tenure in her position, and never being rated as ‘Needs Improvement’ or ‘Unsatisfactory.’ Therefore, OAG’s own evaluations determined that the plaintiff either fully met the expectations and standards of her job throughout her tenure, or that she frequently exceeded those expectations.”
Saporito noted that Robinson was the only older Black woman in HR and was fired – a few years before certain retirement benefits would be achieved - while six white employees remained employed. And when a Black mailroom worker filed a complaint after being called “boy” by a white coworker, Robinson’s investigation efforts were allegedly stonewalled.
“We find that these events constitute pretext for racial discrimination,” Saporito wrote.
Saporito awarded Robinson $209,379.45, including $50,000 in compensatory damages.
