NJ Rastafarian Employee Can Proceed With Discrimination Claim

Last week, a New Jersey federal district court permitted a Camden County, NJ government employee to proceed with his religious discrimination claims under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination, but dismissed his federal and state free exercise claims. Sistrunk v. Camden County Workforce Investment Board, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 28854 (D NJ, April 18, 2007), involved a claim by a practicing Rastafarian that he was dismissed as a Youth Coordinator because he wears his hair in dreadlocks. The court found that issues of fact, requiring a trial, exist on whether notice had been given to the employer about plaintiff's religious beliefs and whether his termination was because of those beliefs. The free exercise claims were dismissed because the Board's dress code was found to be a neutral rule of general application.