On Monday, an attorney for the mother
of five filed a federal lawsuit on her behalf claiming that if
she were black, her Facebook post would not have been considered a fireable
offense in the eyes of her employer.
“Had an African-American journalist
said the same thing, it wouldn’t have generated the same quote-outcry-unquote,”
her attorney, Sam Cordes, “What she said was benign at best. President Obama
has said similar things.”
The lawsuit claims that WTAE-TV, an
affiliate of Hearst Television, violated the Civil Rights Act when it fired
Bell. She wants her job reinstated and to be compensated for backpay and
attorney fees.
“Had Ms. Bell written the same comments
about white criminal suspects or had her race not been white, Defendant would
not have fired her, much less disciplined her,” the suit claims.
Bell’s attorney also suggests in the
filing that WTAE-TV “consistently downplays misconduct” by other reporters and
anchors because of their race or gender, citing one instance where an employee
was not disciplined for making lewd comments to interns that led to the
termination of the internship program and another where a reporter was not
disciplined after being arrested for propositioning an undercover police
officer.
After she was fired in March, Bell told AP she didn’t get a “fair
shake” from the station.
“It makes me sick,” she said at the
time. “What matters is what’s going on in America, and it is the death of black
people in this country. … I live next to three war-torn communities in the city
of Pittsburgh, that I love dearly. My stories, they struck a nerve. They
touched people, but it’s not enough. More needs to be done. The problem needs
to be addressed.”
Bell had worked at the station since
1998 and won more than 20 regional Emmy awards for broadcast excellence. In the
suit, her attorney describes her as a beloved community journalist who was
regularly praised by her employers for her professionalism, judgment and work
ethic. It claims that in her most recent performance review, Bell’s bosses
encouraged the anchor to continue engaging with the audience on her Facebook
page.
The suit claims that the last
performance review also said that Bell was “often exceeding expectations in the
way she embodies [the station’s] core values.”
The news of Bell’s dismissal was leaked
to news outlets hours before the station told her, the suit claims, and
emphasized that the decision coincided with a meeting the station
held that same day with the Pittsburgh Black Media Federation to discuss
the Facebook post and issues of racial diversity.
The federation said they did
not call for Bell to be fired and that their meeting took place after news of
her termination was announced.
In the immediate aftermath of Bell’s
post, angry viewers and commenters flooded the TV station Facebook page, the
comments sections of news reports on the issue, Twitter and Reddit. Others,
however, vehemently defended Bell and praised her for speaking what was on her
mind. In the post, she expressed anger and sadness for the senseless loss of life
at the hands of gunmen she called cowards.
The Wilkinsburg mass slaying case
that inspired the controversial Facebook post has yet to be solved. Two men
described as suspects by prosecutors have not been charged with the murders, but are being
held at the Allegheny County Jail on drug charges in an unrelated case that
dates back to 2013.
Cordes, Bell’s attorney on Monday that he
plans to add a gender discrimination claim to the lawsuit once he receives the
okay from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
Bell has deleted her WTAE Facebook page
and scrubbed her Twitter biography of her ties to the station or the journalism
profession. On a new personal Facebook page, she has conducted informal
interviews with people around the city.
Cordes told the Post-Gazette that Bell
is looking for a job but faces challenges because the TV station told her
it would enforce a noncompete clause in her contract that ends on March 30,
2017.
The station has not commented on the
suit.
I'm glad she's fighting back. She's got FIVE KIDS! Also, leave Shittsburgh, dude. You'll just always be the White lady who told Black folk to stop killing each other. How awful is that?
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