BLACK OFFICERS FILE [ANOTHER] LAWSUIT AGAINST CAPITOL [HILL] POLICE

By Danielle Wright
Posted: 02/08/2012 11:54 AM EST
Filed UnderNYPD, Racism, Police, Washington D.C., Unemployment, Court, Employment

[http://www.bet.com/news/nation/2012/08/02/black-officers]

[Eleven years after Charles Jerome Ware, the nationally known trial attorney who first represented the U.S. Capitol Black Police Association in 2001] filed the first class-action lawsuit a fourth class-action lawsuit has been leveled against the Capitol Police Department.

Approximately fifty officers, civilians and employees have filed a suit in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. They allege that they have been subjected to “continuous, pervasive and egregiously discriminatory actions” by the Capitol Police, as expressed in a statement released Wednesday by the U.S. Capitol Black Police Association.

Hostile work environments, reprisals, denial of promotions, age discrimination and denial of career-enhancing opportunities are just some of the allegations of discrimination outlined in the lawsuit [These are similar allegations to the complaint filed in 2001].

“The Chief of Police, Phillip Morse, and members of the Capitol Police Board, have done little, if anything, to eliminate the obvious inequities that have negatively impacted the careers of African-American officers and employees,” the association claims in its statement.

In 2001, nearly 300 Black Capitol Hill police officers and employees filed a lawsuit citing discrimination by the Capitol Police Board. The current action lawsuit comes more than a decade after the unresolved dispute.

"You have, basically, a renegade police department up here, that's been operating under the protection of Congress," Charles J. Ware, the attorney who first represented the U.S. Capitol Black Police Association, said at the time the suit was announced in 2001.