National: Ex-Atlanta Police Sergeant Sues Chief

hbarber — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 12:56:29 +0000

An African-American ex-Atlanta Police sergeant is suing the city, alleging that Chief Richard Pennington discriminated against her when he let her go two years ago. When the Atlanta Police Department dismissed Karen Wells in April 2007, officials attributed it to a “lie” she had told, she says in her suit. But Wells, who had been with the Atlanta Police Department for 25 years — the last 14 as a sergeant — at the time, says she never lied about anything, only that she misunderstood the question and made a mistake in her response. In her lawsuit, Wells says that her firing was triggered by an internal investigation about whether another city department had paid police officers properly for working additional hours to guard a water main break. In May 2005, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports, a water main broke on Peachtree Street in Buckhead. Wells was granted the extra work hours she had requested to guard the water main break. When asked whether she kept copies of paperwork for “extra jobs,” she said no. Less than two weeks later, the lawsuit contends, Wells told police officials she made a mistake because she was distracted by her mother’s surgery and was suffering from anxiety and depression. The department notified her on April 25, 2007, that she was being terminated, the lawsuit said. Wells, who is Black and 40, argues that she was punished more harshly because of her age, gender and race.

Politics: College Republican Chief Forced To Resign

thenry — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 12:09:00 +0000

He said he didn’t realize his comments about Barack’s “big lips” were offensive.
College Republican chief is forced to resign. The head of the Pennsylvania Federation of College Republicans gave up his seat this week after getting slammed for a racist comment he posted online about Sen. Barack Obama. In late July, Adam LaDuca, 21, a senior at Kutztown University, wrote on his Facebook page that Obama has “a pair of lips so large he could float half of Cuba to the shores of Miami (and probably would.)” But it’s not the first time LaDuca has fired off barbs at prominent Black leaders. Among his other gems, he called Martin Luther King Jr. a “pariah” and a “fraud” and that “Man, if sayin’ someone has large lips is a racial slur, then we’re ALL in trouble.” But his slurs were even too much for his fellow College Republicans, who asked him to step down. The remarks blew up after they were publicized in the Pennsylvania Progressive, a blog written by a Democratic committeeman from Berks County. “The comments were completely uncalled for and very offensive,” said Anthony Pugliese, 22, a senior at West Chester University and chairman of the College Republicans, which has more than 50 chapters statewide. “The P-A College Republicans do not accept or tolerate racism in any way.” DaLuca said he wishes he hadn’t published the big-lips comment. “In hindsight, when you read it a second time, it’s like, ‘oops,’” he said. “It was just a dumb move on my part to make a statement like that public.”

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National: Ex-Atlanta Police Sergeant Sues Chief

Politics: College Republican Chief Forced To Resign