Stellantis engine-plant worker sues over a training prerequisite he says was enforced only against him

The Leak Test dispute is about the order of events. According to the complaint, a supervisor approached a white employee about moving into Tear Down and Leak Test. That employee then began training in Leak Test before attending the lockout/tagout class, a course on safely shutting down equipment ^[5][6]. The worker, that employee and a third colleague later took the class together. None of the three received physical locks there, the complaint alleges ^[5][7]. Afterward, the worker says, he was told he could not train in Leak Test without the required locks, and he alleges the prerequisite was enforced only against him ^[8]. He also reported, in March 2026, that a different white employee with lower seniority was working in Leak Test while he was moved out of the area ^[4].

The complaint pairs that training dispute with lost pay. In October 2025, FCA imposed a 30-day unpaid suspension after a supervisor accused the worker of cellphone-related misconduct and hostility ^[14]. He says the supervisor yelled at him. He also names a white employee accused of comparable device conduct who allegedly was not disciplined the same way ^[14]. A July 2026 report over an earbud proposed another 30 days. He says he was checking his pockets after a break because he believed he had nearly lost his wedding ring ^[15]. Between them the two reports carried 60 days of suspension, 30 imposed and 30 proposed ^[18]. HCAMag's report does not include a response from FCA, and it does not set out how the complaint argues that denied training is a harm on its own under Title VII or Section 1981. The worker presents the training gap and the discipline together, as what he calls a two-track system ^[17].

A skeptic on FCA's side would say a training slot in one production area is a scheduling call, and that the suspensions carry the weight of the case. The worker's answer is his own paper trail. His March 25 note set out the lock sequence 13 days before the April 7 internal communications about the investigation ^[19]. On the earbud charge, a coworker's written statement dated September 15, 2026, cited in the complaint, describes him as having a Bluetooth earbud in his hand ^[16].

HR controls the investigation from start to finish, and the complaint attacks it directly. FCA opened it in about April 2026, and the worker named a union representative as a material witness who was willing and available to speak ^[10]. As the complaint describes them, the April 7 communications said she could not represent certain employees because she was participating. Later in the same record, an FCA employee stated that she was refusing to take part ^[12]. The worker argues that the conflict between those records and what HR told him bears on whether the investigation was adequate and credible ^[13].

For a plant manager, the trade-off is between letting supervisors make exceptions and holding everyone to the same requirement. Letting a worker start in a new area before the safety class, and before locks arrive, may keep a line staffed this quarter. If the same requirement later stops someone else, a court can be asked to weigh the earlier exception against it. At Dundee, the exception in question is the white employee's start in Leak Test ahead of the class he later took with the plaintiff, and it is now pleaded in federal court ^[5][3].