Deaf 7-Eleven manager who was fired awarded $934,000 in discrimination suit

Jim Soliday is deaf, but the 58-year-old Naples man was able to supervise nearly a dozen 7-Eleven stores because he had a system that worked.

He read lips. He used a fax machine to transfer and review data. And he used text pagers to communicate with managers, field consultants, market managers and headquarters.

But his 26-year 7-Eleven career ended three years ago when a new boss arrived and put an end to Soliday’s system.

Without texts and faxes, he couldn’t do his job and was soon fired. He sued, alleging that violated the Florida Civil Rights Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Thursday night, after deliberating for over three hours, a U.S. District Court jury in Fort Myers agreed 7-Eleven unreasonably refused accommodate Soliday, as required by law, and fired him due to his disability.

They awarded him $178,000 for lost wages and benefits and $756,000 for emotional pain and suffering.

When Soliday read the clerk’s lips as she announced the verdict, tears welled in his eyes.

Soliday’s attorney, Darrin Phillips of Naples, said Soliday felt vindicated.

“The law does not permit an employer to take away a man’s livelihood through discriminatory means,” Phillips said Friday. “We are grateful that the jury saw through 7-Eleven’s deceit and that the jury carefully weighed the evidence in concluding that 7-Eleven denied Jim Soliday’s requests for reasonable accommodations and unlawfully terminated his employment on the basis of his disability.”

Soliday is now unemployed, he said, adding, “it’s an unlevel playing field for someone with a disability.”

The award will exceed $1.6 million if Judge John Steele grants Phillips’ motion for roughly $675,000 in future wages. But he expects 7-Eleven to appeal.

Soliday couldn’t be reached for comment, nor could the jury forewoman.

7-Eleven’s attorney, Eric Welter of Herndon, Va., who was assisted by co-counsel Michael Stoker, declined comment, except to say “7-Eleven will be assessing all of its legal options.”

The verdict came after a seven-day trial, with testimony from 10 plaintiff’s witnesses and five for the defense. Jurors heard closing arguments Thursday.

Soliday, who answered questions by reading lips, spent 2½ days testifying about his rise through the ranks of the worldwide convenience-store chain, and how reviews show he’d met or exceeded expectations.

Pretrial statements provide this account:

Soliday suffers from a severe hearing loss and can only hear the lowest, deepest tones. The hereditary sensory nerve condition began in childhood.

By the late 1970s, he was wearing a hearing aid and could use a telephone until the late 1980s. By 1995, his hearing loss reached 95 percent and he used the Florida Telecommunication Relay or another service for phone calls.

He was hired in 1982 as a career development trainee for a Dayton, Ohio, 7-Eleven store and assisted and trained managers in the Dayton, Springfield and Cincinnati area. The next year, he was promoted to field consultant, supervising stores in cities and suburbs.

In 1986, he was transferred to Naples, where he supervised one store during a yearlong acclimation period, then oversaw about nine stores in the Naples and Fort Myers area until he was fired.

He transferred and reviewed data — price changes, orders and shortages — between stores, field consultants, market managers and headquarters.

In 1987, he requested a fax machine to make it easier and they became common in the Florida division. In 1999, he asked for a text pager, which became common practice.

Due to Soliday’s expertise with failing stores, his boss, Market Manager Joe Sucharzewski, transferred him to East Fort Myers in 2006 to supervise inner-city stores in mostly high-crime, poorer neighborhoods with a history of turnovers.

Two years later, Terry Hutchison became his boss.

When fax machines broke, Hutchison refused to replace them and eliminated text pagers. Soliday told him that caused an “extreme hardship” but Hutchison said he had to find a solution with equipment they used.

Market managers used Blackberrys, so Soliday asked for one, but was told he’d have to buy it and pay the monthly bills. Because store managers didn’t have cellphones with QWERTY keyboards, they didn’t reply to his texts.

“Soliday would gladly have paid the approximately $2,300 per year for him and his subgroup to keep the text pagers because, ultimately, it would have assisted Soliday in keeping his job,” the pretrial statement said.

Hutchison conducted frequent management meetings by conference call, often disrupting Soliday’s quality visit schedule. He’d have to rush to a store with a “trusted” manager trained in conference-call relay or find a field consultant who could tell him, face-to-face, what was said. Some occurred Saturday mornings, so he’d drive to a store, while others could call from home.

Hutchison ignored his complaints and often called other field consultants, but didn’t communicate with Soliday.

Soon after a May 2008 training session on quality visits, Soliday was accused of not doing his job, although he provided proof he was doing inspections. After a final warning, he was fired that August for willful refusal to perform required jobs.

7-Eleven contended it didn’t discriminate, noting it terminated a non-disabled employee that day for the same reason. It maintained it wasn’t required to accommodate an employee in any manner an employee desired because they’re only entitled to a ‘reasonable’ accommodation.”

7-Eleven noted Soliday was provided with a Blackberry, never complained and was not “denied” a fax machine, which was not necessary for him to perform “essential functions.”