NEW HUDSON, Mich. – A federal lawsuit has been filed against a Michigan body assembly company by an amputee who said he was fired because of his disability.
Jimmie Shannon had been working at the Cosma Body Assembly plant in New Hudson since September of 2018. His lawyer, Jim Rasor, said he was fired in November of 2020 shortly after new managers took over the facility -- they believe it was because of his disability.
“They hired Mr. Shannon with a disability. This isn’t new. Then a new supervisor came along and they put him in a job that he simply could not do,” Attorney Rasor said.
Shannon, who only has one arm, said he was placed in a strenuous position on the “door line” -- a position he said he had no chance of successfully working.
“I just couldn’t do it. One, I was never moving fast enough and two, I didn’t have the proper training to go through with it,” Shannon said.
As a result, Shannon and his attorney are seeking $25,000 in damages.
“There’s no expectation in anybody’s mind that this door job was something that a person could do if they were missing an arm. You just can’t do it with one arm,” Rasor said.
The lawsuit also states that Shannon was harassed in the workplace once the new supervisor took over.
“We had people that came through there that had two arms that couldn’t perform the job and they got rid of them. So I don’t have no idea what made them think I could do it,” Shannon said.
The assembly company declined to comment for this story.
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