US jury orders Tesla to pay $3.5 mn to worker over racial abuse

Elon Musk-run Tesla has been ordered to pay $3.2 million to a worker over his racist treatment at the company.

A San Francisco jury ordered the electric car-maker to pay Owen Diaz who previously worked as an elevator operator at Tesla.

Diaz worked at the company's Fremont factory from June 2015 to May 2016 as a contract worker hired by a staffing company, about what was described as "racial abuse".

In 2021, a jury ordered Tesla to pay $137 million in damages to Diaz, which was slashed to $15 million in April last year, calling it "excessive".

Now, the jury has settled on a $3.7 million payment after Diaz challenged the judge's decision, reports The New York Times.

Diaz had claimed he worked in an environment where "daily racist epithets" were common, and he claimed Tesla did not do enough to stop it.

Tesla defended itself against the claims and said that the earlier $137 million award was not fair, and managed to reverse the award back down to $15 million.

Tesla recently countersued California Civil Rights Department (CRD), that had alleged racial bias at the electric car-maker's US factory.

The CRD had sued Tesla over allegations of Black workers being subjected to "mistreatment, harassment, unequal pay and a hostile work environment".

The automaker has been accused of racial bias at its plants in the past.