He says Firestone forced his transfer, skipped his raises, and pushed him out after he spoke up
A Missouri auto technician says he was forced to transfer, underpaid while training his white colleagues, and fired after complaining to the EEOC.
The lawsuit, Dieckmann v. Bridgestone Retail Operations, LLC, No. 4:26-cv-00792, was filed on May 19, 2026 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri. The plaintiff, Eeveon Dieckmann, who identifies as African American and Native American, worked as a technician at a Firestone Complete Auto Care store before his termination on November 27, 2025. He is suing for race and national origin discrimination, hostile work environment, and retaliation under Title VII.
The story, as Dieckmann tells it, begins in February 2025. He says Bridgestone gave him a choice: transfer to the Florissant, Missouri store or lose his job. Sweetening the deal, the company allegedly told him he could interview for a management role at the new location. He interviewed, he says, and he was qualified. He was denied the role and offered only a technician position. When he later spoke with the man who had supposedly conducted the interview, that person, according to the filing, said he had no recollection of the interview ever happening.
What followed, Dieckmann claims, was a steady accumulation of slights. Under a new supervisor identified in the filing only as "Joe," he says he was assigned to train Caucasian employees who were paid more per hour than he was, even though they leaned on him to learn the job. Promised raises, he alleges, never came. When he asked about management openings, he says, he was told he lacked certain certifications, requirements he claims were waived for white coworkers. On one occasion, the filing states, he was told a position had gone to an outside hire who then never showed up to fill it.
The work environment, Dieckmann alleges, grew tense. He says a previous manager, "Butch," signaled to staff that it was fine to bring firearms to the shop. On April 28, 2025, the filing states, a coworker made a gesture at him miming the drawing of a gun. Bridgestone investigated, and, according to the complaint, both Butch and the coworker were fired.
Dieckmann also alleges he was singled out in smaller, daily ways: reprimanded for not wearing safety goggles while colleagues who weren't wearing theirs were ignored, watched more closely than others, and made to ask for assignments that flowed freely to white coworkers. He recalls one moment, described in the filing, when his supervisor walked up while he was listening to R&B and remarked that he "listens to black people music, too."
Dieckmann says he first contacted the EEOC in March 2025 and kept raising concerns internally, most recently in September 2025. Two months later, he was let go. The reason given, according to the filing, was that he had not finished a job, though no specifics were provided.
Bridgestone has not yet filed a response, and no court has ruled on any of the allegations, which remain unproven.
