Law360 (August 12, 2021, 8:54 PM EDT) — The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has slapped an Applebee’s eatery with a lawsuit in Florida federal court accusing it of promoting a toxic workplace that saw a gay Black cook subjected to racist and homophobic taunts and an eventual firing.
The EEOC suit filed Thursday says the restaurant chain’s eatery in Plant City, Florida, was a workplace where employees wore Confederate flag paraphernalia and tossed around racist and anti-gay slurs, leading line cook Jebriel Teague to complain about a hostile work environment based on his sexual orientation and race along with unjust cuts in his work hours.
