Employee Fired for Eating Pork Files Religious Discrimination Lawsuit

August 12, 2004

Source: The Orlando Sentinel

http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/news/nation/9386959.htm

On August 12, 2004 The Orlando Sentinel reported, "Lina Morales claims she was fired from an Orlando company because she ate a BLT sandwich at work. In her religious-discrimination lawsuit against Rising Star Telecommunications, she alleges she lost her job as administrative assistant for violating a policy banning pork and pork products from the workplace. Morales says the rule constitutes religious discrimination because it is based in Islamic law for the benefit of some Muslim employees who were offended by the presence of pork - and at the expense of non-Muslims such as Morales, who is Catholic. She also is suing under the Florida Whistleblower Act because she claims she was held to a higher level of scrutiny and labeled insubordinate for complaining to her employer that the no-pork policy violated her civil rights."