Case: Hill v. Merrill Gardens LLC

On June 25, 2004, two African-American job applicants filed this class action lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Indiana, against Defendant Merrill Gardens LLC. Represented by private counsel, the plaintiffs alleged that the Merrill Gardens, a private corporation, maintained a secret policy of notating all African-Americans’ job applications in an effort to prevent African-Americans from being hired. This, they said, violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

This case was ultimately assigned to Chief Judge Theresa Springmann.

On January 4, 2005, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”) separately filed suit in a case available (in this Clearinghouse) against Merrill Gardens under Title VII for a pattern or practice of refusing to hire people of color and failing to preserve records relevant to determining whether discriminatory practices had taken place. The EEOC sought relief for six named applicants of color and a class of people of color adversely impacted by the defendant’s alleged discrimination. Because of the similarity between the claims and the classes, the court consolidated the two cases.

On June 16, 2005, the parties negotiated a proposed resolution of the cases together because they involved overlapping claims and classes. The parties requested that the cases be consolidated solely for the purpose of approving requested class relief in the Hill action and entry of a proposed consent decree in the EEOC action. The court accordingly granted preliminary approval of the requested class relief and the proposed consent decree.

On September 9, 2005, Judge Springmann held a fairness hearing whereby the court heard evidence and testimony of interested parties to determine whether the proposed settlement was fair, adequate, and reasonable.

On October 6, 2005, the court granted final approval of the class action settlement and entry of the consent decree. 2005 WL 2465250. The class included the named plaintiffs (the “known class”) and all non-white job applicants who applied for a position at Merrill Gardens between February 17, 1998 and April 18, 2005 who were denied employment for positions that were or may have been given to non-minority applicants (the “unknown class”). The settlement agreement awarded $324,000 to the known class, shared among the named plaintiffs. The unknown class received $325,000. In addition, the agreement awarded class counsel $100,000 in attorneys’ fees.

On October 4, 2005 in the parallel EEOC action, the court entered a negotiated consent decree against Merrill Gardens. The decree, which lasted a total of 42 months, ordered Merrill Gardens to:

• Post a notice of nondiscrimination

• Provide equal employment opportunity training to all employees and provide the Commission all written materials for review prior to the training

• Revise its application and hiring procedures in accordance with nondiscrimination best practices.

There has been no litigation subsequent to the approved settlement agreement and the case is now closed.

[SORT THIS OUT] The consent decree requires Merrill Garden to hire without using race as a basis, and generally not to discriminate or retaliate in violation of Title VII. It requires the defendant to pay a total of $750,000 to known and unknown class members, including $100,000 in attorneys' fees. Additionally, Merrill Gardens must post and distribute a notice of non-discrimination, give non-discrimination training to its employees, keep relevant records, and report to the EEOC. The docket sheet doesn't show any further enforcement took place; the case was presumably closed in 2009.