Muslim Police Officer's Discrimination Claim Dismissed On Procedural Grounds

In Webb v. City of Philadelphia, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 11762 (ED PA, Feb. 20, 2007), a Muslim woman police officer brought four discrimination charges against the Philadelphia police department after it refused to allow her to wear khimar (Muslim head covering). In this decision the court dismissed two of those charges on procedural ground. Her Title VII claim of sex discrimination based on the fact that the department granted religious accommodations for men to wear beards was dismissed because that charge had not been presented to the EEOC. Her state claim of religious discrimination under Pennsylvania's Religious Freedom Protection Act was dismissed because she had not given the city the required statutory notice of her claim before filing suit.