Firm Agrees to Pay Jewish Engineer $72,500 for Turning Him Down for a Job in Saudi Arabia

A Jewish engineer who charged the Ralph Parsons Company, a California-based international contracting firm, with religious discrimination for turning him down for a job in Saudi Arabia, has received a $72,500 settlement from the company.

The complainant, Morris Hochberg, claimed in a U.S. District Court that although his professional qualifications were never questioned, he was rejected after a Parsons official asked him if he was Jewish and he answered in the affirmative. Hochberg was supported in his suit by the American Jewish Congress.

The engineer was working in Chicago in 1981 when he replied to an advertisement in the Chicago Tribune calling for a “principal project manager.” After checking his qualifications, a Parsons official invited him by telephone to come to California at company expense for a series of interviews.

In California, he learned that the work location was in Yanbu, Saudi Arabia. Then, according to Hochberg, a Parsons executive told him that he would like to ask a “sensitive” question: “Are you Jewish?” When the engineer replied that he was, the official reportedly stated: “I wish I had asked you that question on the telephone while you were still in Chicago.”

Hochberg was turned down for the job, although, he noted, his professional qualifications were never questioned or in dispute. He filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and won the commission’s permission to bring suit in a U.S. District Court in California.

Hochberg was represented by the Chicago law firm of Altheimer and Gray. The Los Angeles firm of Gilbert, Cooke and Sackman served as local counsel. The plaintiff also received support and assistance from the legal staff of the Chicago division of the American Jewish Congress. His suit charged the Parsons company with violating Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination on grounds of race or religion.

The company agreed to pay $72,500 in damages as part of an out-of-court settlement. The Parsons company, without admitting guilt — a customary practice in such agreements — promised it would adhere in the future to a policy of processing all applications and applicants for employment with Saudi Arabian employers “in a nondiscriminatory manner, without regard to the religion of any applicant.” Parsons also declared that, in the future, it will enforce a company prohibition against any inquiry concerning an applicant’s religion.