Riot Games’ Legal Troubles Don’t Look Like They’re Stopping Anytime Soon
Riot Games’ legal troubles don’t seem like they are stopping anytime soon with renewed opposition from plaintiffs in its discrimination lawsuit.
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Riot Games’ legal troubles don’t look like they are stopping anytime soon as plaintiffs in the case against the League of Legends developer have withdrawn their motion for the proposed $10 million gender discrimination settlement and retained new legal counsel. Recently, two California state agencies spoke out against Riot’s proposed settlement in a lawsuit centered around a well-publicized culture of discrimination against female job candidates and employees.
California’s Department of Fair Employment and Housing says that the proposed settlement amount was too low and that the women should be paid close to $400 million. The California Division of Labor Standards Enforcement accused Riot of using the low settlement amount to evade taking responsibility for state labor code violations. Riot has defended the settlement amount, saying that the changes it has made since the lawsuit was filed, which have improved things (but not enough) at the company according to employees – justify what many consider an unreasonably low settlement. The DFEH claims that that settlement doesn’t force Riot to change anything, so any fixes are entirely at the whim of the developer.
According to GamesIndustry.biz, Riot Games’ victims have also hired new counsel, who has rejected the proposed settlement. Plaintiffs Melanie McCracken, Jessica Negron, and Gabriela Downie have retained women’s rights attorney Genie Harrison, who is known for her involvement in cases targeting the Weinstein Company, as well as employment lawyer Joseph Lovretovich.
Riot maintains that the $400 million settlement proposed by the DFEH is unreasonable and that “analysis and discussions which led to the earlier proposed settlement were comprehensive and thorough.” The company admits that stock options, which are a major part of employee compensation – “especially for men,” a DFEH representative told GamesIndustry.biz – were not considered in analyses of pay disparities. The judge was set to rule on the DFEH and DLSE’s proposed intervention, but that has been delayed for the time being.
The plaintiffs’ surprise move represents a major change from their previous attorneys, who the DFEH has accused of colluding with Riot. The LoL developer told Screen Rant that there was “no collusion,” but the recent changes seem to indicate that there may very well have been collusion between the parties. In any case, it is clear that Riot Games’ legal troubles will continue for quite some time, prior collusion or no. While the company has made some minimal effort to fix its image in response to the lawsuit, there is no guarantee that it will stay the course if anything similar to the initially proposed settlement actually happens. Though Riot deserves some credit for making some changes, the settlement must contain an action plan to prevent it from falling back into old ways regarding its treatment of women.
Link Source : https://screenrant.com/riot-games-legal-troubles-continue-gender-discrimination/