EEOC Sues Penney Opco for Disability Discrimination

ATLANTA – Penney OpCo, LLC, doing business as JC Penney, a retail department store chain with over 600 stores and distribution warehouses nationwide, violated federal law when it denied a warehouse employee a reasonable accommodation and then fired her because of her breast cancer, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) charged in a lawsuit announced today.

According to the EEOC’s suit, a warehouse associate at the JC Penney logistics center in Forest Park, Georgia was diagnosed with breast cancer and requested time off for medical appointments. She submitted the required written accommodation request, medical documentation of her treatment and need for leave from work; however, JC Penney denied her request. Because her request was denied, the time she took off from work for her cancer treatment counted against JC Penney’s attendance points policy, and when she exceeded the number of points allowed, she was fired on July 3, 2023, the EEOC charged.

“Federal law requires that employers accommodate employees with disabilities, which includes granting time off from work to seek medical treatment,” said Marcus G. Keegan, regional attorney for the EEOC’s Atlanta District Office. “In this case, the employee followed all of JC Penney’s requirements to obtain an accommodation, including submitting medical documentation, but JC Penney still denied her request for leave and assessed her points against its attendance policy.”

The alleged conduct violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which requires the reasonable accommodation of disabilities absent undue hardship, and prohibits employers from discharging an employee because of their disability or because they engaged in protected activity. The EEOC filed suit (EEOC v. Penney Opco LLC, Case No. 1:25-cv-06582) in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, Atlanta Division, after first attempting to reach a pre-litigation settlement via its conciliation process. The EEOC is seeking back pay, front pay, compensatory damages and punitive damages for the defendant’s former employee, as well as injunctive relief to prevent future discrimination.

Darrell Graham, director of the EEOC’s Atlanta District Office, said, “Applying an attendance points policy strictly against an employee who needs leave from work to treat her breast cancer violates the Americans with Disabilities Act unless it is an undue hardship, which was not the case here.”

For more information on disability discrimination, please visit https://www.eeoc.gov/disability-discrimination.

The EEOC’s Atlanta District Office has jurisdiction over Georgia and the counties of Allendale, Bamberg, Barnwell, Beaufort, Berkeley, Charleston, Colleton, Dorchester, Georgetown, Hampton, Jasper and Williamsburg in South Carolina.

The EEOC is the sole federal agency authorized to investigate and litigate against businesses and other private sector employers for violations of federal laws prohibiting employment discrimination. For public sector employers, the EEOC shares jurisdiction with the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division; the EEOC is responsible for investigating charges against state and local government employers before referring them to DOJ for potential litigation. The EEOC also is responsible for coordinating the federal government’s employment antidiscrimination effort. More information about the EEOC is available at www.eeoc.gov. Stay connected with the latest EEOC news by subscribing to our email updates.