Fired Iowa prison worker wins $1.25 million in discrimination lawsuit against state

A former Iowa prison employee who claimed she was fired after complaining about harassment has been awarded $1.25 million by a Polk County jury.

Jennifer Wilson-Brady was hired to work in the kitchen at Mount Pleasant Correctional Facility in February 2021. In June of that year, though, she was terminated by the Department of Corrections. In her lawsuit, filed in 2022, she alleged she was fired because she had complained to her supervisors about coworker Byron Stevens, who she said had made sexist remarks about "feminazis," had screamed at and berated her, and had physically intimidated her.

According to Wilson-Brady's complaint, Stevens was suspended during an investigation, but on the same day that he returned to work, she was fired, supposedly for being a "security risk." Her firing came less than three weeks after she had received a positive performance review.

After a four-day trial, the jury sided with Wilson-Brady, finding her firing had been retaliatory and awarding her $1.25 million for past and future damages.

"We are pleased jurors recognized what Jennifer Wilson-Brady knew all along, that she was fired for reporting sex-based harassment," her attorney, Stuart Higgins, said in a statement. "All the credit goes to Jennifer for her tenacity and courage in pursuing this case.”

How did attorneys for the state explain firing?

A Department of Corrections spokesperson declined to comment, but in court filings, the state argued there were legitimate performance concerns behind Wilson-Brady's firing.

Filings prior to trial list a number of reported errors by Wilson-Brady, the most serious of which was a claim that she at one point "signed out a knife to an inmate under the wrong name," an "obvious security concern." Wilson-Brady also reportedly "wandered off on her own" several times before completing staff security and safety training, to the point that the prison's then-warden recommended she be fired. Her director supervisor decided to give her another chance, the state's attorneys said.

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They said Wilson-Brady, however, showed a "lack of receptiveness to coaching," bristling at or laughing off feedback or reprimands over the knife incident or failure to follow meal preparation instructions. It was due to these concerns and the approaching end of her six-month probationary period that prison officials decided to fire Wilson-Brady, the state said.

As for the underlying complaints against Stevens, the state said his actions, although "brusque," were not motivated by gender or sufficiently threatening to create a hostile environment, calling him instead "a perfectionist with high standards for himself and those around him."

William Morris covers courts for the Des Moines Register. He can be contacted at wrmorris2@registermedia.com or 715-573-8166.

This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Iowa prison worker awarded $1.25 million in discrimination lawsuit