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Court rules in favor of fired transgender funeral director

Posted at 2:11 PM, Mar 07, 2018
and last updated 2018-03-07 14:11:52-05

DETROIT (AP) — A federal appeals court has ruled in favor of a woman who said she was illegally fired by a Detroit-area funeral home after disclosing she was transitioning from male to female and dressed as a woman.

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Wednesday R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Home in Garden City discriminated against director Aimee Stephens by firing her in 2013. The decision returns the case to a federal judge who had dismissed the lawsuit filed by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

The EEOC learned the funeral home provided clothing to male workers dealing with the public but not females.

The appellate judges say it was reasonable for the EEOC to investigate and discover the “seemingly discriminatory clothing-allowance policy.”