The owner of a Mexican restaurant in New York City got a serious slapdown from a state appellate court over his treatment of a lesbian chef.
As reported in the publication LBGTQNation, Gloria's Tribecamex and its owner, Edward Globokar, were ordered to pay Mirella Salemi $1.6 million in damages.
The case rests upon incidents that occurred between 2004 and 2007 at another Mexican-themed restaurant owned by the defendants where Salemi was employed. Salemi, the publication said, claimed she was forced to attend weekly prayer meetings at work where homosexuality was described as sinful.
“At these meetings, Globokar would repeatedly call homosexuality a sin, and say that ‘gay people’ were ‘going to go to hell,’” the publication reported.
Salemi sued, claiming discrimination. A lower court awarded her $1.6 million in late 2012. The defendants appealed, and lost at the appellate level, where the verdict and the amount of the award were upheld last month.
The publication said that Globokar invoked his freedom of religion rights under the First Amendment as his defense, but the court turned him down.
“The trial court properly protected Globokar’s First Amendment rights by instructing the jury that he had a right to express his religious beliefs and practice religion, providing that he does not discriminate against his employees based on religion or sexual orientation,” the justices wrote.
“Given the extensive evidence of defendants’ discriminatory conduct, we do not find that the punitive damages award was grossly excessive,” the appellate court concluded.
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Dan Cook
Dan Cook is a journalist and communications consultant based in Portland, OR. During his journalism career he has been a reporter and editor for a variety of media companies, including American Lawyer Media, BusinessWeek, Newhouse Newspapers, Knight-Ridder, Time Inc., and Reuters. He specializes in health care and insurance related coverage for BenefitsPRO.
