The EEOC sued over the slur - but the worker who reported it got written up too
An employer wasn't liable for a worker's racial slur, a federal appeals court ruled - even though its response "could have been stronger."
On August 4, 2026, the US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed a jury's finding that Sun Chemical Corporation, a maker of inks, colorants, and coatings, did not discriminate against a Black technician who was targeted with a racial slur by a co-worker.
The dispute grew out of a relationship between two technicians that fell apart over time. One had trained the other, but tensions built. According to the court's account, they boiled over one morning when the co-worker confronted the technician over his work ethic. The two traded expletives. The co-worker then followed him to his locker, punched it hard enough to leave a dent, and screamed a racial slur at him three times.
The technician reported the incident to a manager that same morning. The company suspended the co-worker for five days without pay and warned him that future incidents could lead to more discipline, up to termination. The technician who reported the slur received a written warning of his own, for using profanity.
Unhappy with that outcome, he filed a charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). After conciliation failed, the EEOC sued the company under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, arguing it had gone too easy on the co-worker. A jury sided with the company.
On appeal, the EEOC argued the jury was misled by instructions that asked only whether the company responded properly to harassment, not whether it had failed to prevent it.
The appeals court did not resolve that question. Instead, it held that the evidence could not support a failure-to-prevent theory. To be liable, the court said, the company needed actual or constructive knowledge of "ongoing" harassment, and it had to decline "remedial action reasonably calculated to stop" it. Neither was present.
On knowledge, the court found that, at most, the company may have known of one earlier incident - the same co-worker using the slur toward the plant's only other Black employee. One incident, the court said, would not mark him as a "known serial harasser."
On the response, the court found the company had taken "preventative remedial action" after that earlier incident, sending the co-worker a written "disciplinary action." It "could have been stronger," the court said, but it reflected the co-worker's more than three decades of service without a history of harassment.
