Sutter Health will greatly improve accessibility and patient care for people with disabilities at its hospitals and other health care facilities under a settlement to a class-action lawsuit announced Friday.

The agreement calls for sweeping changes in hospital policies, architecture, equipment, staff and contractor training and outreach at 28 Sutter Health hospitals located across Northern California. The changes are tailored for patients with mobility, visual, hearing and speech disabilities.

The class-action suit filed in 2005 by the nonprofit Disability Rights Advocates asserted that the Sutter network of hospitals and medical foundations failed to provide access for disabled people as required by the Americans with Disabilities Act.

No one really disputes that Chad Hudgens was waterboarded outside a  Provo office park last May 29, right before lunch, by his boss.

There is also general agreement that Hudgens volunteered for the "team-building exercise," that he lay on his back with his head downhill, and that co-workers knelt on either side of him, pinning the young sales rep down while their supervisor poured water from a gallon jug over his nose and mouth.

And it's widely acknowledged that the supervisor, Joshua Christopherson, then told the assembled sales team, whose numbers had been lagging: "You saw how hard Chad fought for air right there. I want you to go back inside and fight that hard to make sales."

What's at issue in the lawsuit Hudgens filed against his former employers -- just as in the ongoing global debate over the CIA’s waterboarding of terrorism suspects -- is the question of intent.

Prosper Inc. maintains that what the supervisor did, while unauthorized, overzealous and misguided, falls far short of torture, and in fact was not nearly as bad as Hudgens makes out in his quest for damages.

Citigroup Inc. on Friday confirmed it agreed to pay $33 million to about 2,500 current and former female brokers at its Smith Barney unit to settle a class-action gender discrimination lawsuit.

The agreement also requires the largest U.S. bank to change how it awards bonuses and assigns accounts, and to adopt measures to help retain and promote women, papers filed Wednesday with the U.S. District Court in San Francisco show.

The plaintiffs had accused Smith Barney in the original March 2005 complaint of preventing female brokers from competing fairly for new accounts, promotions and pay, and of depriving women of equal training and sales support. They also accused Smith Barney of using past performance as a means to award business and pay -- putting women who had been discriminated against in the past at a disadvantage.

A state court jury in Bridgeport has awarded more than $4 million to a doctor who was fired from a health care lab in Stratford after he complained that one of its tests could jeopardize patients' health.

The six jurors found on Friday that Dianon Systems Inc.'s firing of Trumbull doctor G. Barry Schumann in April 2005 violated his free speech rights. The verdict could increase to nearly $7 million when lawyers' fees and interest are added in.

Dianon spokeswoman Donna Schuetz says the company disagrees with the verdict and intends to appeal.

Read the full article here on Boston.Com.

A federal judge has signed off on Walgreen Co.'s plan to pay $24 million to settle a federal lawsuit alleging racial bias at the nation's largest drugstore chain.

Roughly 10,000 past and present black Walgreen workers will split $20 million under the consent decree given final approval Monday by U.S. District Judge G. Patrick Murphy.

Mario A. Barrera and Lacey L. Gourley, Partners with Bracewell & Giuliani, have a great synopsis of the admissibility of “Me Too” evidence in employment discrimination cases and the Supreme Court’s decision that it should be determined on a “Case by Case” basis.

Carol I. Buckman, Counsel in the New York office of Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP, has written an article detailing how the subprime mortgage crisis will accelerate the trend of lawsuits against 401(k) plan fiduciaries, and how these fiduciaries can reduce their risk of becoming a target.

You can read her full article here on the Employee Benefit News website.

The Supreme Court decided Wednesday that employees who claim job discrimination should not suffer because of mistakes made by the federal agency charged with investigating their allegations.

The U.S. Supreme Court will hear five cases this term that will deal directly with age discrimination. The cases at the court include what kind of evidence an employee may present to bolster an age discrimination claim; whether retirement-age workers are entitled to disability payments; and whether federal workers who complain about age discrimination are protected from retaliation.

Read the full story here on MSNBC.COM.

US District Judge Peter Dorsey rejected a motion filed by General Electric (GE) to prevent a high ranking attorney’s lawsuit from achieving class action status.

Dorsey rejected the argument from GE that Schaefer cannot lead a class action lawsuit because she had access to confidential client information while employed with GE. Dorsey’s ruling did state, however that "If at any point during discovery, the defendants learn and can demonstrate that plaintiff is inappropriately using confidential client confidences in asserting her claims or representing the class, the court may reconsider the propriety of plaintiff's class allegations at that time."

An appeals court in Fresno, California overturned a $1.5 million verdict awarded to a woman who was spanked in front of her co-workers in what employers called a camaraderie-building exercise.

Information about the original decision on this case can be found at this link, and the updated article on the appeal can be found in the Seattle Times.

A group of former employees of the Eastman Kodak Company have filed a class action lawsuit seeking nearly 500 million dollars against Morgan Stanley on the grounds that the broker gave them bad advice to retire early and promised them financial security that never materialized.

Four employees are named as plaintiffs, however the member class could number as many as 1,000.

In addition to this class action lawsuit, an arbitration claim making similar allegations on behalf of another 16 former Kodak employees was filed at the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority’s arbitration forum.

Ford Motor Company, two related companies and the UAW (United Auto Workers) have settled a race discrimination lawsuit by paying 1.6 million dollars and providing other relief. The United States EEOC charged that a written test to determine eligibility for an apprenticeship program discriminated against blacks. More information about this settlement can be found here on the BusinessWeek website.