A veteran of the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office claims she faced cruel discrimination and retaliation at work while she looked after her ailing parents, a new lawsuit alleges.
40-year-old Joan Davila, the demoted former head of the office’s crucial extradition office, was subject to years of “caretaker discrimination, retaliation and harassment” which included the temporary revoking of her health insurance coverage and being asked to stop talking about her father, who had recently passed away, per The Post.
Davila revealed that after her initial complaints were taken for granted, she tried to ask for help from higher-ups in the office, yet everyone turned a blind eye to the matter and refused her pleas.
RELATED STORIES
“There’s no empathy,” Davila said, calling the office she loved for nearly four decades now a “toxic environment.
“All this combined is because of the care of my parents,” she said of the alleged abuse she suffered.
“When the DA’s Office violates anti-discrimination laws, it betrays the very principles it is sworn to uphold — and it must be held accountable”, the veteran of the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office’s lawyer, John Scola added.
According to The Post, the city’s Law Department turned down the option of making a comment on the pending litigation, which was filed a week ago in Manhattan Supreme Court.
40-year-old Davila was raised in Park Slope, Brooklyn, and stated that she started her career at the DA’s office because of encouragement she once received in 1984 from her high-school guidance counselor.
The veteran of the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office began as a clerk, then went on to become a paralegal before eventually overseeing the DA’s extradition office.
However, Davila said things went south once her parents — who reportedly moved to Florida when her dad retired after years of working in a jewelry and Christmas ornament factory in Brooklyn — fell ill and were in dire need of care.
She revealed that it was in 2019 that the retaliation against her began, and it unfolded when she initially used paid family leave to look after her parents.
She added that it took up to three months at a time, and that when she returned to work, she received the message that she couldn’t get any more overtime. That call made her file a complaint with the Office of Equal Employment Opportunity.
In early 2023, the situation exacerbated when she returned from a three-month paid family leave to find her extradition position handed over to an employee hired when she was not around, per her lawsuit.
“I was coming back to nothing,” she told The Post. “I was devastated.”
She said it was “like if you remove an officer’s revolver and put him on desk duty. … I definitely loved what I did.”
Davida revealed she was offered a new role as head administrator for a trial bureau, yet when her father needed her help with care again in 2024, her new supervisor started to retaliate against her.
Instructions and erratic deadlines were part of the retaliation, “like sabotage,” she stated.
Months later, her overtime had been restored, although it was still just a couple of hours per pay period. “I felt like it was retaliation,” Davila said. “It’s happening all over again to me.”
The lawsuit alleges that her supervisor, Siobhan Carty, explained the move to her by telling her, “I had to do your work while you were away.”
Davila revealed that in February, only days after filing another complaint, Carty “stormed into my office,” where she proceeded “to rip into Plaintiff for taking leave,” per the suit.
The veteran of the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office says she began to cry and explained that the leave was the best way for her to care for her dad, who died only a month earlier from dementia, diabetes and heart problems.
The year before, Davila’s mother had also passed away.
Carty revealed that she “doesn’t not understand why you keep mentioning your father” and added that Davila is “probably just doing this to build a case”, accusing her of recording the meeting, per the suit.
The meeting then led to the threat of a demotion, Davila claimed.
In March, a worker discovered her health insurance was suddenly canceled and she missed two paychecks, allegedly in retaliation for stress-related complaints.
Although her insurer said only the DA’s office could cancel coverage, the office denied involvement.
It then took two weeks to reinstate her insurance, and since then, retaliation worsened, including denied remote work requests and being assigned paralegal tasks.
Davila believes such treatment wouldn’t have occurred under former DA Robert Morgenthau and that is the reason she’s filed the suit, hoping something is done about the treatment afforded her at work.
