Tesla and Black former employee settle $3.2 million discrimination case

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) – Tesla and a Black man who worked at the corporate’s California factory have settled a long-running discrimination case that drew attention to the electrical vehicle maker’s treatment of minorities.

Owen Diaz, who was awarded nearly $3.2 million by a federal jury last April, has reached a “final, binding settlement that fully resolves all claims,” ​​in line with a document filed Friday in U.S. District Court in San Francisco.

The document, which didn’t contain any details of the agreement, indicated that each side agreed that the matter had been resolved and the lawsuit against the corporate run by Elon Musk could possibly be dismissed.

Messages were sent Saturday in search of detailed information from Tesla’s lawyers and Lawrence Organ, Diaz’s lawyer.

The April ruling was the second in Diaz’s case in search of to carry Tesla accountable for allowing racist epithets and other slurs for use against him during his temporary employment at a factory run by the pioneering automaker in Fremont, California.

But the eight-person jury in the most recent trial, which lasted five days, set a much lower damages amount than the $137 million Diaz won in his first trial in 2021. U.S. District Judge William Orrick reduced that quantity to $15 million, prompting Diaz and his lawyers to hunt a brand new trial somewhat than accept the lower amount.

In November, the Authority filed notice that Diaz would appeal the $3.2 million judgment, and Tesla filed a cross-appeal.

The case, which dates back to 2017, centers on allegations that Tesla didn’t take motion to stop a racist culture on the factory positioned about 65 kilometers southeast of San Francisco. Diaz claimed that in his roughly nine-month tenure at Tesla, which resulted in 2016, he was called the “N-word” greater than 30 times, was shown racist cartoons and was told to “go back to Africa.”

The same Tesla factory is within the crosshairs of a racial discrimination case brought by California regulators. Tesla has vehemently denied the state court allegations and responded sharply, accusing regulators of abuse of power. In September, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed an identical grievance.

Musk, Tesla’s CEO and largest shareholder, moved the corporate’s headquarters from Silicon Valley to Austin, Texas, in 2021, partly attributable to tensions with various California agencies over practices on the Fremont factory.