The prison guard who left the work-release inmates unattended lost his discrimination claim

Yeah, I know. Shocker, right?

A prison guard for the Arkansas Department of Corrections drove 27 work-release inmates in a van to a parking lot next to a fried chicken joint. Rather than hit the drive thru, the prison guard left the 27 criminals in the van and went inside to place his order.

For what it’s worth, the prison guard testified that there were no other customers ahead of him in line. Further, the prison guard thought that his chicken stop did not violate any employer policy or rule.

[Can’t wait until I revise my next prison guard handbook to include the “Don’t leave work-release inmates alone in a getaway vehicle to order fried chicken” policy].

So, yeah, dude got fired.

He filed a grievance and lost. Then he sued for race discrimination in federal court, and now finds his out-of-court self the subject of a snarky post on an employment-law blog.

Why did he lose in federal court, you ask?

Would you believe that the prison guard was unable to show that his former employer’s reasons for fire him were pretext for discrimination? Specifically, the prison guard couldn’t point the court to anyone who had also gone on a chicken run and left 27 work-release inmates unattended.

The opinion is silent about whether he enjoyed the chicken.

The case is Beard v. Arkansas Dep’t of Correction.

This post has been updated to remove typos.