A federal jury on Monday has ordered Tesla Inc.
to pay more than $ 130 million compensation to a former black worker named Owen Diaz, found him being the target of a hostile work environment, the Wall Street Journal reported.
The jury decided that the company failed to take reasonable steps to prevent Diaz, a contract worker who worked as an elevator operator at the Fremont Tesla factory in 2015 and 2016, from racially harassed, adding the newspaper.
Tesla and his lawyer did not immediately respond to Reuters’s comment requests.
Diaz’s lawyer also did not respond to a comment request.
Before the trial began, presenting Judge William Orrick rejected Tesla’s efforts to exclude one jury from the jury, said he believed the effort was based on race and “discriminatory intentionally.” Last year, electric car makers were disclosed in the first US diversity report that black employees were 4% of the role of American Leadership Tesla and 10% of the total workforce in the country.
The trial was heard at the US District Court, the North District of California.