The EEOC claims that Signature Industrial Services, LLC unlawfully fired three workers because they have hemophilia.
The West brothers went to Tim Bowne and the EEOC after they claim to have a problem with Signature industrial.
"Since they were hard workers and they showed up for work on time, did good work for the company, they feel what happened to them was wrong. Their medical condition doesn't prevent them from being good workers," Bowne, a trial attorney with the EEOC said.
According to a statement, the EEOC says that Drew West and Anthony West were working at the Exxon Mobil refinery in Beaumont when SIS took over a contract to perform mechanical services at the plant.
Drew and Anthony were hired by SIS around December 2011.
The EEOC says that hemophilia A does not impede job performance, but it requires expensive medicine for treatment if they sustained an on-the-job scrap or injury that causes bleeding.
Raymond West, the third brother who also has hemophilia A, started working for SIS at the Beaumont Exxon/Mobil refinery around January 2013.
According to an EEOC statement, after the plant manager who refused to fire the West brothers stopped working at the plant in April 2013, SIS upper management told the West brothers’ immediate supervisor that if he didn’t fire the three, SIS would fire him.
On July 3, 2013, all three West brothers were told they were being fired immediately due to a reduction in force, although no workers besides the West brothers were laid off that day.
The brothers claim their condition was the reason Signature fired them after working for two years with the company.
"The upper management of the company became concerned that the insurance cost related to the West brothers' condition were eating into the company profits," Bowne said.
Bowne claims the company did not want to handle the liability if the West brothers got injured.
12News is still waiting for Signature's comment on the case.
Bowne hopes that this lawsuit will prove the West brothers don't have to experience this sort of worry at work.
"If they're good workers, doing a good job for the company, you need to treat them based upon their abilities and not what you perceive to be disabilities," Bowne said.
The West brothers did not wish to comment at this time. They say they are working with different industrial companies at this time.