A casino poker dinner, a screen-shared maternity policy, and a collapse on a doctor's floor
She had the track record, the global praise, and 19 years of pharmaceutical experience, according to the complaint. Then her new manager arrived.
A former Global Director of Oncology Marketing has filed a federal lawsuit against Merck & Co., alleging a nearly three-year campaign of religious, racial, pregnancy, and disability discrimination that ended with her termination while she was on approved disability leave recovering from emergency bowel surgery.
The complaint, filed October 9, 2026, in the US District Court for the District of New Jersey, brings 12 legal claims against the pharmaceutical giant and the worker's direct supervisor under federal civil rights, family and medical leave, and employee benefits laws, as well as New Jersey's anti-discrimination, whistleblower, and earned sick leave statutes.
The worker joined Merck in January 2022, the complaint states. A licensed pharmacist with two graduate degrees, she oversaw multimillion-dollar biomarker initiatives, earned a "Successful" performance rating under her previous managers, and drew consistent praise from colleagues across three continents. Her total annual compensation was between approximately $300,000 and $350,000, the filing says.
That changed in May 2023, the complaint alleges, when a new supervisor took over her team.
The worker was the only Egyptian, Middle Eastern, and Muslim member of his team, according to the filing. She had disclosed her faith months earlier when she declined wine at a team dinner during the holy days following Ramadan.
The complaint alleges the supervisor immediately held her to standards he did not apply to colleagues. He allegedly required her to fly from North Carolina to New Jersey twice a month - approximately 15 trips between May and November 2023 - while no other remote employee on the team faced comparable requirements. He criticized her performance but, the filing says, refused to identify a single measurable deficiency, telling her to "figure it out" and accusing her of "not adulting as a director level."
Then came the casino poker dinner.
In December 2023, according to the complaint, the worker attended a full day of business meetings at Merck's Global Oncology conference but skipped the evening casino poker dinner. Gambling is forbidden under her faith, and the complaint says she was also limping in an ankle brace from an injury earlier that day. The filing alleges her supervisor later documented her absence as a performance concern, writing that it "gave the impression that you were more focused on personal activities than the meeting."
By early 2024, the complaint says, the worker had absorbed a doubled workload, delivered a project a predecessor had spent 18 months on, and processed diagnostic programs at a pace the filing describes as unprecedented. Her supervisor himself emailed the team: "Congratulation on the achievement."
Days later, according to the filing, he rated her "Needs Improvement" - the lowest on Merck's three-level scale - and cut her bonus in half. The complaint alleges his own review reproduced seven favorable colleague assessments on the first page of the very document that gave her a failing grade.
The worker reported religious discrimination to HR in writing on March 8, 2024, the complaint states. One week later, an HR representative allegedly acknowledged the supervisor's management was "not done properly" and promised coaching. According to the filing, the same HR representative dismissed praise from approximately 20 colleagues documented in Merck's own system, saying: "They are your friends they will put that to please you."
Merck's Office of Ethics opened an investigation and closed it in August 2024, the complaint says, finding no discrimination.
Nine days after that, the filing alleges, the supervisor learned the worker was pregnant.
The timeline from there, as set out in the complaint, is striking. On August 27, 2024, Merck's leave administrator notified the supervisor of the pregnancy. On August 28, the complaint alleges, he questioned whether Merck would actually pay for her maternity leave - and the worker had to share her screen to display Merck's own policy to prove her entitlement. The filing says an HR representative was in the room and did not intervene. On August 29, the complaint states, the supervisor sent her a "High" importance performance write-up.
Six weeks later, the filing alleges, he gave her an ultimatum: accept six months of severance or face formal discipline. The worker was already entitled to six months of paid maternity leave under Merck's policy, the complaint notes.
What followed, according to the filing, was a disciplinary sequence that continued through pregnancy, maternity leave, and disability leave. The complaint alleges the supervisor's own boss ordered corrections to the first performance memorandum after the worker proved several of its accusations were inaccurate - expired deadlines, already-completed deliverables. Merck's Legal Department was consulted. The filing says roughly half the memorandum was modified. The discipline stayed in place.
During her maternity leave, the complaint alleges, the supervisor conducted a negative year-end review, lowered her rating again, and decided - before she had returned to work - to put her on a Performance Improvement Plan. According to the filing, when she challenged the fairness of imposing discipline before she had worked a single day back, he replied: "it is what it is."
After returning from nearly seven months of leave in June 2025, the complaint says, the worker discovered and reported two compliance concerns: that physicians' personal data had been sent to marketing employees across multiple countries without authorization, and that a physician proficiency testing program had been redesigned so that no one could fail. The filing alleges the supervisor responded not by addressing the reports but by issuing a second performance memorandum 15 days later.
The complaint also alleges the supervisor repeatedly approached an outside agency to solicit negative feedback about the worker. According to the filing, the agency's account lead was asked directly whether the worker cost more to service than other employees. She allegedly answered: "No, we are agency of record, and we work by a rate card."
The formal Performance Improvement Plan came on September 19, 2025, the filing states - one day after the worker's counsel renewed a demand that Merck reassign her. The complaint alleges the supervisor identified the worker's request for emails related to the physician-data disclosure as a performance "concern" during the PIP meeting. The filing says HR witnessed this and allowed the PIP to proceed.
Three weeks in, the complaint says, the worker collapsed on the floor of her doctor's waiting room and was taken by ambulance to hospital. Her psychiatrist attributed her condition to workplace stress, according to the filing. The complaint states she had lost 30 pounds in two months.
In December 2025, the filing alleges, she required emergency bowel surgery that left her with short bowel syndrome - a permanent condition.
While she was on approved disability leave recovering from that surgery, the complaint alleges, Merck informed her in February 2026 that her position had been "eliminated." When she asked to transfer, according to the filing, HR told her: "No, you cannot transfer due to your performance rating." The complaint says that rating was one her supervisor had written.
Merck terminated her on May 29, 2026, the filing states - seven weeks after her long-term disability benefits began. She was the only employee on long-term disability included in the purported separation, according to the complaint. Her work was redistributed to two other employees.
Merck's own Long Term Disability plan, the complaint alleges, promised continued employment, continued medical coverage, and a 60-day window to find another position before termination. The filing says Merck followed none of it.
For HR leaders, the complaint reads as a detailed account of what can go wrong when performance management sits entirely in one supervisor's hands and internal complaint handling fails to produce meaningful intervention - even when HR acknowledges a problem exists.
The allegations in this complaint have not been tested, and no court has made any findings on the claims.
