The Broad and its former chief working officer are going through a second lawsuit in lower than every week, accusing them of discrimination, retaliation and defamation.
Former HR director Darron Rezell Walker filed the primary swimsuit, alleging that former COO Alysa Gerlach pressured him to fireplace a white worker, Rick Mitchell, 65, primarily based on private dislike — in addition to his age and race — after which fired Walker when he failed to seek out enough trigger for that motion.
Mitchell filed the second lawsuit, for $10 million, on Thursday in Los Angeles County Superior Court docket. He alleges that Gerlach orchestrated his termination primarily based on his age and “racial hatred,” and fabricated a justification for firing him after an investigation that she requested Walker to undertake didn’t discover proof of wrongdoing on Mitchell’s half. The lawsuit additionally accuses the Broad of failure to stop retaliation, and Gerlach of defamation for allegedly knowingly making false claims about Mitchell and his skill to do his job.
Gerlach, who not works on the Broad, didn’t instantly reply to The Instances’ request for remark. The Broad didn’t reply to a query concerning the circumstances of Gerlach’s departure.
Mitchell was employed by the Broad from Jan. 1, 2015 — about 9 months earlier than it opened to the general public — till his termination in late April of final yr. In keeping with the lawsuit, Broad founder Eli Broad shortly promoted Mitchell from chief engineer to director of amenities. In that capability, Mitchell was liable for the 120,000-square-foot museum’s upkeep and operations. The Broad homes greater than 2,000 postwar and up to date artworks.
The lawsuit quotes numerous glowing efficiency opinions, together with one from 2020 that notes Mitchell “is a terrific leader of his team, genuinely caring about them and continuing to ask them to challenge themselves with new projects. He is a respectful and dependable collaborator and he has excellent relationships across teams.”
When Gerlach, who’s Latina, arrived in 2022, the lawsuit alleges, she was instantly hostile to Mitchell. She allegedly mentioned she had spent her complete profession working in “a white man’s world” and that she didn’t need “an old white man” heading up amenities. She allegedly mentioned she wished to remake the division with “fresh eyes” and “fresh blood.”
The occasions resulting in Mitchell’s termination started in early 2024 when Gerlach staged six weeks of weekly coaching, which the lawsuit says was introduced as a “safe space” meant to permit “a free flow and exchange of ideas and information without judgment.”
Throughout this time, Mitchell expressed issues about duties assigned to his staff that didn’t align with their job descriptions — together with work that required the flexibility to elevate and assemble heavy items of a manufacturing stage, in response to the lawsuit. Numerous women and men on Mitchell’s staff have been nervous about their well being and security, the lawsuit says, so Mitchell raised the difficulty throughout the coaching classes.
4 days later, in response to the lawsuit, Mitchell was suspended. Gerlach accused him of creating “derogatory, offensive and inappropriate” feedback. Gerlach allegedly requested then-HR director Walker to conduct a office investigation of Mitchell, allegedly calling Mitchell a “misogynist,” saying she “hated” him and “we are trying to find a way to fire him.” Walker complied and located no wrongdoing, the lawsuit says.
Gerlach allegedly dismissed Walker’s findings and fired Mitchell anyway, in response to the lawsuit. A number of weeks later, she allegedly fired Walker for objecting to Mitchell’s termination.
“There’s no documentation of him ever having done anything that justified termination,” mentioned Mitchell’s legal professional, Bernard Alexander, including that the Broad was given a duplicate of Mitchell’s criticism six months earlier than it was filed and that the museum “never, ever came to the table with anything that makes sense.”
“Now we have no choice but to publicly say this is how they treat their loyal employees,” Alexander mentioned. “There is no reason why Mr. Mitchell should have been treated this way. He was thrown away as though he did not matter, and now they’re standing behind it as though what occurred was justified.”
