Seven Black former employees of an Idaho-based door-making company who worked at an Aurora location have filed a federal lawsuit against their employer, alleging they were called “monkeys” by a supervisor, were passed over for jobs and promotions in favor of white workers and were fired unlawfully because of their race.
The lawsuit was filed against Woodgrain Inc., with headquarters in Fruitland, Idaho, in U.S. District Court in Colorado.
“The breadth of Woodgrain’s racially discriminatory practices reflects a pattern and practice of intentional discrimination on the basis of race against African Americans that cuts across departments and permeates Woodgrain’s Aurora facility,” the lawsuit states.
The plaintiffs allege that one of the managers at Woodgrain’s Aurora facility called several of the Black employees “monkeys” last fall, and referenced them engaging in a lewd act with a coconut. The employees “were shocked by this blatantly racist comment,” the lawsuit states, and one of them told the manager he sounded like “an Alabama slave master saying things like that.”
The lawsuit alleges that management at Woodgrain, which is described in the document as “one of the nation’s largest molding, millwork and door manufacturing companies,” never addressed their complaints with remedial or disciplinary action and effectively attempted to sweep the matter under the rug.
A request for comment from Woodgrain wasn’t immediately returned Tuesday.
Plaintiff Ron Lamb, a production manager with Woodgrain, told The Denver Post he had worked for a prior company, TrimCo Millwork, for nearly 10 years before it was bought by Woodgrain in late 2023.
“I never had a writeup — all I did was move up,” said Lamb, 56.
The new Woodgrain managers who came in last year “pulled the rug out from under me,” Lamb said Tuesday.
“For me being there as a senior manager, it hurt me so bad,” he said of the devolving situation he found himself in. “When that started happening, I’m not in any more meetings. I’ve been in this building for 10 years. It was humiliating to me.”
His 30-year-old son, Darius Wynn, is also a plaintiff.
The lawsuit, filed on May 21, states that a new manager who started at the Aurora facility last year wanted to change the culture at Woodgrain, which plaintiffs argue included “replacing African-American employees with white employees.”
The lawsuit accuses the manager of hiring “young white employees” with little or no experience in door and molding processing.
“Many of these new white employees would be placed in identical positions to long-tenured Black and Hispanic employees, including plaintiffs,” the lawsuit reads. “Despite working the same jobs, many of the new white employees at the Aurora facility earned more than their Black and Hispanic counterparts.”
An appeal to Woodgrain’s human resources department resulted in a manager telling the employees the company was “hitting the reset button and that they would not be discussing Plaintiffs’ complaints of racial harassment and discrimination,” the lawsuit alleges.
At the end of 2024, the seven plaintiffs signed a petition decrying the situation. The letter was signed by 21 mostly Black and Hispanic workers at the plant, the lawsuit states. From Jan. 17 to Jan. 29, “seven of the Aurora facility’s African American employees, all of whom had signed the open letter … were involuntarily terminated.”
Several of the dismissed employees were identified as “low performers” even though each of them “had received positive performance reviews just days earlier,” the lawsuit claims.
The plaintiffs are making racial discrimination and retaliation claims against Woodgrain and are asking for financial remuneration for “lost wages, restricted career opportunities, damage to reputation,” among other damages.
Lamb, who lives in Aurora, is still out of work.
“I’m still looking for employment,” he said.
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