Dearborn Discrimination Lawsuit Could Face Legal, Cultural Hurdles

An employment discrimination lawsuit filed against the City of Dearborn on Nov. 23 still has no trial date set, but speculation as to how the case will turn out is bubbling.

The suit, filed on behalf of Southfield resident John Benitez Jr., accuses the city of sex discrimination for firing Benitez from the city’s health department in 2010.

The department has since closed, due to . However, Benitez's suit requests relief for lost wages and benefits, legal fees, as well as the reinstatement of his position with the city.

Benitez is represented by Bloomfield Hills employment attorney Deborah Gordon.

The federal lawsuit alleges that Benitez, a registered nurse, was fired from the Dearborn Health Department for treating “female patients wearing headscarves” at the instruction of a doctor at the clinic, although he was told not to do by his supervisor. The action, the suit contends, was a violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 because his firing was partially based on the “unlawful consideration of his sex/gender.”

The city has not offered any comment on the case.

According to the lawsuit, the supervisor’s instructions to Benitez not to treat Muslim female patients were based on “the clinic’s conservative male Muslim clientele (who) did not want a male treating female patients.”

'Health Care is Culture-Bound'

A policy of allowing patients to choose the gender of their health care provider based on cultural or religious needs is not unheard of in Dearborn. In fact, it’s standard procedure at the nonprofit health clinic run by , which provides screenings, check-ups, flu shots and other standard medical treatment to clients.

“ACCESS’ policy does not say that a male physician cannot treat or see or diagnose or screen a female patient,” said Dr. Adnan Hammad, co-founder and director of the ACCESS Community Health Department. “But ACCESS says that a patient or client should be given a choice.”

More than a policy, Hammad said, the practice is “a matter of business ethics.”

“Gender-specific medical services that are culturally appropriate and language specific are the best services that you can give to a patient,” he said. "Health care is culture-bound."

According to Hammad, the ACCESS clinic has built its client base around providing culturally sensitive treatment. The clinic makes visits to homes and mosques, building relationships with the clientele. The clinic offers transportation to appointments or surgery, and accompany patients to services rendered outside of the clinic.

As a result of their work, Hammad said, the clinic went from seeing 50 patients per year in 1996 to nearly 2,500 per year now. He attributes it all to providing culturally and religiously specific care.

Benitez’s lawsuit asserts that a similar policy at a public clinic–such as Dearborn's Health Department–is unconstitutional.

"When you get to the point that taxpayer-funded entities are having to comply with personal religious beliefs rather than letting people do their job you're going down a road that does not end in a good place," Gordon told the Detroit News. "If people don't want to be treated, they can go find their own practitioner."

Discrimination May Be Difficult to Prove

Detroit attorney Joel Sklar, who also handles employment discrimination cases in metro Detroit, said that it’s unclear whether it was lawful for the taxpayer-funded department to cater to religious and cultural needs.

“Having treatment isolated or limited so it comes within your own religious belief could be a heavy demand,” Sklar said.

However, he added that the case could come down to a determination of whose rights were more important: Benitez, or the female Muslim client.

While not an exact analogy, Sklar pointed to 1955 Alabama, when medical care was explicitly segregated between whites and blacks.

“Today, we would find that inherently unlawful and disturbing,” he said.

And when it comes down to it, public health clinics’ first requirement is to provide treatment, regardless of the clients’ race, religion, or ethnicity.

Moreover, Sklar pointed out that even if the firing was unjust, it will be difficult to prove that sex discrimination played a part in the supervisor's decision to terminate his employment. This is due to a legal argument known as Same Actor Inference, which reasons that a person who hires an employee in a protected category (such as a male) will not later discriminate against that employee.

And, depending on the details surrounding the incident that led to Benitez’s firing, a ruling in his favor could set precedent for similar policies–thus opening the door to future litigation on the same basis. And that, Sklar said, is something the courts don’t want to do.

“I’m not sure that this is what discrimination laws were intended to prohibit,” he said.

The lawsuit  is currently in the U.S. Eastern District Court of Michigan before Judge Lawrence Zatkoff. Gordon has demanded a jury trial for the case, but no action has currently been taken to set a court date.