Two ex-Disney employees are suing their former employer for laying them off in favor of cheaper foreign workers, and then making them stay on for 90 days to train their replacements. The two lawsuits were both filed in Florida as potential class actions, and claim that Disney and two contractors engaged in a “conspiracy to displace US workers,” in violation of the anti-racketeering RICO statute, which is apparently a “novel claim.”
According to Ars Technica, the two plaintiffs are IT workers who were included in a group of 200-300 Disney employees who were laid off last year. Initially, they filed an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaint alleging discrimination based on age and national origin, but the lawsuit only includes the racketeering claims. “I felt like I was part of destroying our economy because I had to train a replacement that was going to come here, take my job and potentially take other people’s jobs,” says Leo Perrero, one of the plaintiffs.
Disney has countered that while they moved some IT jobs to India, they were adding U.S.-based jobs as well. They also say they hired back 100 workers who had been laid off, and offered the other plaintiff, Dena Moore, another job at comparable pay.
(Via Ars Technica)