Federal officials have filed a complaint against the Sheetz convenience store chain, claiming that the business discriminated against minority job candidates.
Lawsuit against Sheetz
The Sheetz chain of convenience stores, which operates over 600 outlets across six states, is operated by Sheetz, Inc., Sheetz Distribution Services, LLC, and CLI Transport, LP. The EEOC filed a lawsuit against these entities together. The lawsuit claims that Sheetz has long had a policy of checking all job candidates for criminal conviction histories and then rejecting them on the basis of those findings.
According to the EEOC, Sheetz’s employment procedures unfairly excluded Black, Native American/Alaska Native, and multiracial candidates. According to the EEOC, Sheetz’s employment practices across the board violated Title VII’s prohibition on disparate impact discrimination. The lawsuit makes no claims regarding Sheetz’s hiring practices being influenced by race.
The organization discovered that 14.5 percent of Black job candidates were rejected because they were judged to have failed the company’s criminal background check, compared to 13.5 percent of multiracial applicants and 13.5% of Native American applicants who were denied employment.
In 2022, the EEOC informed Sheetz that it was probably in violation of civil rights laws. However, the agency said that its attempts to mediate a settlement were unsuccessful, which led to this week’s complaint.
What Sheetz said?
Sheetz claimed on Thursday that it “does not tolerate any form of discrimination.”
“Inclusion and diversity are fundamental components of who we are. We consider these accusations to be true. A spokesman for the business, Nick Ruffner, stated in a statement, “We have tried to cooperate with the EEOC for nearly eight years to establish common ground and resolve this disagreement.