A former Osaic employee has filed a federal discrimination lawsuit alleging her extended leave due to a COVID-19 infection and a compromised immune system led to her firing.
The lawsuit was filed Friday in the U.S. District Court of the Northern District of Alabama. She initially charged Osaic with discrimination in November 2022 through the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
In that original filing, Julietta Scruggs alleged retaliation for her disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 by her employer, Highland Capital Brokerage, both of Birmingham, Ala. (The company is a subsidiary of Phoenix-based Advisor Group, a network of independent broker/dealers with 11,000 affiliated advisors, which rebranded in April 2023 as Osaic.)
Born in Romania, Scruggs lived in an orphanage as a child, her suit states. She said during this time, she was exposed to bovine spongiform encephalopathy, more commonly known as mad cow disease, and other illnesses. (According to the Associated Press, Romania began testing in 1995 for mad cow disease, which is fatal to cows and can cause a deadly brain disease in people who eat tainted beef.) Even after being adopted by an American family in 1996, Scruggs said her immune system was left weakened by her early experiences, making her more susceptible to illnesses such as pneumonia and shingles.
Highland Capital hired Scruggs in May 2022 as operations coordinator. She said her supervisor, Kathryn Andringa, assistant to CEO Jim Gelder, worked remotely while requiring Scruggs to work in the office.
Two months after being hired, Scruggs said she saw several other employees coming into the office with symptoms of COVID-19 without taking precautions or notifying coworkers they may have been exposed. As a result, Scruggs asked Andringa and Carolyn McKinley, human resources representative, if she could work remotely. She claims they told her to, “Get a mask and deal with it,” which she did.
Even so, in August 2022, Scruggs tested positive for COVID-19. Scruggs claimed Highland Capital Brokerage’s disability management company, Unum, approved a leave of absence. Unum extended her leave through the end of September 2022 after a second positive test and a doctor’s declaration that her illness had progressed to being a restrictive lung disease, which decreases the amount of air the respiratory system can hold.
The day before her leave ended, Scruggs said McKinley called and informed her they were terminating her employment because her absences had caused a hardship due to her “request that (she) remain off work for an indefinite period ... due to several leave extensions and without a confirmed return to work date.” Scruggs said her physician cleared her to return to work with no restrictions the following day, but McKinley declined to rehire her for the position.
In December 2023, Wesley Berta, a federal investigator, declared that the EEOC would not proceed with an investigation, yet made no determination about whether Osaic had violated the law. Berta informed Scruggs she had 90 days to file the lawsuit.
Through its public relations firm, Haven Tower Group, Osaic declined to comment. Messages seeking comment from Scruggs’ attorney, Allen Arnold, were not immediately returned.