A federal judge has ordered Walmart (NYSE:WMT) immediately to rehire a woman with Down syndrome and give her more than $50,000 in back pay after she prevailed in a disability discrimination lawsuit related to her firing from a Wisconsin store.
But the judge denied a request to force Walmart to take other actions for the next five years in light of how it treated Marlo Spaeth.
Walmart told the media on Wednesday that it would comply with the order to give Spaeth her job back.
But a spokesman said the company has not decided whether to appeal the ruling on back pay, along with $300,000 in jury damages.
“We take supporting all our associates seriously and routinely accommodate thousands with disabilities every year,” Walmart said.
The judge’s order is the latest development in a more than five-year court battle between the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and Walmart, the nation’s largest private employer. The federal agency sued Walmart on Spaeth’s behalf, after the retailer refused to accommodate her disability and fired her after nearly 16 years of working at one of its Supercenters.
As part of the lawsuit, the EEOC had asked Judge William Griesbach to require the big-box retailer to add training for managers about the Americans with Disabilities Act.
The EEOC also had wanted Walmart to notify all employees about a jury’s verdict in Spaeth’s favor, their legal rights and their ability to contact the federal agency to report violations.
Shares in the retail giant opened Thursday down a dime to $139.36.