Discrimination Suits Declined from 2003 to 2006. But Are They Now On the Rise?
The Justice Department issued a press release yesterday which announced that the number of civil rights cases filed in U.S. district courts declined from 40,516 to 32,865 (nearly 20 percent) between 2003 and 2006. "Civil rights claims" are defined as those that "involve allegations of discrimination in areas such as employment, housing, welfare benefits or voting rights based on an individual’s or group’s race, sex, religion, age or physical condition."
Readers of this blog will be interested to learn that, according to the press release, "[t]he growth, stabilization and decline in civil rights filings were largely attributable to employment discrimination cases which rose from 8,413 in 1990 to nearly 23,800 in 1997 and then declined to 14,353 in 2006." You can read the DOJ's full report here.
But this declining trend in employment discrimination case may be old news by now. According to this post from the Manpower Employment Blawg, EEOC discrimination charges filed in the first quarter of its 2008 fiscal year were up 21% compared to the same period last year. More charges generally lead to more lawsuits.
One other point about the DOJ press release: It notes that civil rights cases disposed of by jury trial resulted in median damage awards ($146,125) that were about two times higher than cases disposed of by bench trial ($71,500). Meanwhile, the rate at which plaintiffs won at trial "did not differ appreciably between jury and bench trials." This supports the conventional wisdom that if you're an employee-plaintiff, you should seek a jury trial when possible. And if you're an employer, you should opt for a bench trial if the plaintiff will consent. But, of course, plaintiffs almost never do.
