Post Brothers Lawsuit: Guns, Porn and Racial Discrimination?
Until they were fired last March, Raymond Roberson and Lamar Love were maintenance workers for Rittenhouse Hill, a Germantown apartment complex owned and operated by Michael and Matthew Pestronk, aka the Post Brothers, the developers who have made news thanks to their ongoing disputes with Philadelphia’s unions. And now Roberson and Love, both of whom are African American, are taking their former employers to court.
The pair have filed a federal lawsuit in Philadelphia naming the Post Brothers company, Michael Pestronk individually, and Post Brothers employees Yvette Stewart (pictured, between Matthew and Michael Pestronk), Donald Blakeman and Robin Haelle. The suit alleges racial discrimination and also makes some wild claims involving guns.
According to the suit, the whole mess began in March when Stewart, Blakeman and Haelle accused Love of using a company computer to view pornographic material on company time. Love was fired, and Roberson, who was Love’s supervisor, was written up for allowing it to happen on his watch. But both men say that another employee, who is white, had already admitted to being the porn perp.
Apparently management’s meeting with Roberson didn’t go so well, because it supposedly ended with Stewart telling Roberson, “If you come back in here again, I will shoot you myself.” The suit maintains that Stewart carries a handgun.
In the days after that meeting, claims the suit, Roberson says he became ill and, based on his doctor’s advice, asked management for information relating to recent asbestos abatement work that had been done in the building. It was after Roberson brought up the litigious A-word that Michael Pestronk allegedly “left a voicemail message on plaintiff Roberson’s home phone using profanity and making statements that plaintiff found threatening to his well being.”
The same day, according to the Post Brothers lawsuit, “defendant Blakeman along with two security guards carrying handguns went to plaintiff Roberson’s home at the direction of defendant Pestronk. At that time, defendant Blakeman advised plaintiff Roberson that his employment was terminated.”
Both men say that they were mistreated because of their race and that the company created “a hostile work environment.”
“This lawsuit is completely without merit and the description of events grossly inaccurate,” says Michael Pestronk. “These guys are simply not credible. The fact is they were fired because they were watching porn on their work computer, rather than actually doing work. To make matters worse, one of them went to their former supervisor’s house the day after he was terminated waving a gun around and making threats. This is a straightforward case of termination for cause and to say it had anything to do with race discrimination is completely absurd. The reality is that nearly 50 percent of our employees are African American, up to and including top management positions.”
The plaintiffs’ attorney was not immediately available for comment.
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