“Judge upholds jury’s $7.8M verdict in BART COVID vaccine case”
A federal judge on Monday blocked Bay Area Rapid Transit’s attempt to toss out a jury verdict that found the transit agency discriminated against six former employees who sought religious exemptions to its COVID-19 vaccine mandate.
In October, a jury determined that BART owed $7.8 million in damages to the six ex-employees, who were fired or forced into retirement after declining the vaccine, according to court documents. The transit agency tried to overturn the verdict, but the motion was denied.
Under a 2021 mandate approved by the agency’s Board of Directors, BART employees were required to receive the vaccination or risk termination. The Pacific Justice Institute, a conservative legal nonprofit, filed a lawsuit the following year on behalf of the six workers, who described themselves as devout Christians.
In an earlier verdict in the case, jurors found that BART had failed to show that accommodating the former employees’ religious exemptions would pose an “undue hardship” to the agency.
BART tried to overturn the motion and ask for a new trial, arguing that scientific evidence supported their original argument that firing unvaccinated employees was a necessary public health measure. The agency also argued that accommodating employees’ religious exemptions in other ways, like granting unpaid leave or allowing them to work while taking other precautions like wearing masks, would have posed an undue hardship, according to court documents.
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Maliya Ellis, originally from New Haven, Conn., is a recent graduate of Harvard University, where she studied Social Studies and edited the Harvard Crimson’s weekly news magazine. Her summer newsroom internships — on the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s features desk and the Boston Globe’s metro team — have confirmed her passion for deeply reported local news. In her free time, Ellis enjoys long runs and word games. She is excited to explore a new coast and a new city.
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