Autumn Lampkins has filed a lawsuit against a Kentucky Fried Chicken franchise she used to work for, alleging she was discriminated against for wanting to use a breast pump.
Lampkins had a baby just a few months before she was hired as an assistant manager at KFC in Camden in 2014. According to the lawsuit, when she told the company that she intended to breastfeed at work, they didn’t have any issues with it.
However, they ended up making it more difficult for her to pump her breast milk. She was only allowed to pump once every 10-hour training shift, instead of every two hours.
Once Lampkins completed her training, there was a new boss. The district manager, Emily Martin, moved Lampkins to a Dover KFC as a shift supervisor, which demoted her from an assistant manager.
“This was a demotion and not at Ms. Lampkins’ request,” the lawsuit states. “Emily Martin explicitly told Ms. Lampkins that her demotion to shift supervisor was because she was pumping breast milk while at work.”
When Lampkins worked at the Dover KFC, employees allegedly complained that she took breaks to pump while they still had to work. They even threatened to walk out. Lampkins also claims that she didn’t have many opportunities to pump, “causing her embarrassment, pain, and a decrease in breast milk supply for her son.”
Lampkins had no choice but to give her son formula sooner than she wanted to because she couldn’t pump breast milk at work.
Lampkins quit a few months later after she found out that she was going to get fired for “inadvertently [taking a customer’s] jacket home.”
The case is headed to jury trial in early February.
For more information about personal injury claims, visit Cohen & Cohen
