The Cobb County Commission settled a federal discrimination lawsuit Tuesday in which police Lt. Craig Owens accused the department of passing him over for promotions because he was on military active duty in 2008.
Although the settlement amount was approved by commissioners, it has still not been made public, despite requests by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution made under Georgia’s Open Records Act.
Owens and another lieutenant, James Brown, filed a suit in 2013 accusing the county of passing them over for promotions multiple times because of their race. Both men are African American. The discrimination claim over military duty was unique to Owens.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Walter Johnson last year dismissed the racial discrimination claims in a 146-page opinion that went into meticulous detail about the county’s promotion policies and how it evaluated the men against other candidates. Each candidate was scored in a variety of categories, including performance evaluations, past disciplinary history, education, length of time as a lieutenant, fitness evaluation, interview panel rating and supervisory evaluation.
The county has “presented a detailed account of the criteria Chief (John) Houser used to make promotions in 2012, 2013 and 2014,” the judge wrote.
The judge refused to throw out Owen’s claim of discrimination based on military service, saying that would be an issue for a jury. Owens contends in the suit that former chief C.B. Hatfield told him in 2008 that he could not be promoted while away on military duty. Owens was serving in the U.S. Army Reserves in Afghanistan.
“In February 2008, Chief Hatfield and the relevant decision-maker, Public Safety Director (Mickey) Lloyd, both informed Lt. Owens that his military leave status barred him from a promotion to captain,” the judge wrote. Owens “was denied a promotion about four months later, while on military leave.
“These comments are significant pieces of circumstantial evidence. The four-month gap between them and the adverse action does little to dampen the strong inference of discriminatory intent.”
Owens attorney could not be reached for comment Tuesday. A county spokeswoman emailed the newspaper an explanation of Cobb’s decision to settle.
“Because a number of witnesses regarding those 2008 events no longer work for the County, considering the length of time that had passed since the alleged incidents, and considering the costs and risks of continuing to litigate the matter, the County negotiated a cost-effective resolution of the remaining military status claims, providing finality to the matter,” the statement said.
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