CLEVELAND — Cuyahoga County plans to hire outside counsel to fight a lawsuit filed by one of its employees, according to internal emails obtained by News 5 Investigators.
Eileen Curry, a customer service aide, filed the lawsuit earlier this year after the county removed workplace accommodations that were previously in place prior to the pandemic.
"We would not be here if the county just did the right thing," Curry said.
'My kryptonite... is patchouli'
Curry said she suffers from chronic migraines. She said she averages 20 migraines a month, which are often triggered by perfumes, fragrances and other smells.
"My kryptonite one is... patchouli," she said. "When you're dealing with it, it is like a sledgehammer is smashing your head."
Curry said her migraines are also triggered by bright lights.
"I describe it like shards of glass coming into my eyes," Curry said.
Curry filed a disability discrimination charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in 2019, according to a lawsuit filed by her attorney earlier this year.
In 2020, she said the county agreed to give her a private workspace to do her job as a customer service aide.
After she returned to work in November 2024, she said her accommodation was removed.
She said she was assigned to work in a public hallway next to the lobby and a men's restroom.
"I just, like, flabbergasted and shocked," she said. "And it, it just went downhill from there."
'Physically assaulted with fragrances..."
Curry said there are colleagues who wear heavy perfume around her, and that one colleague physically pushed her into a room where perfume was sprayed.
Curry said she has had to go to the emergency room multiple times.
"She's being continually physically assaulted with fragrances while she's at work — and the county knows about it and they're not doing anything," Keith Hansbrough, Curry's attorney, said.
When Hansbrough asked the county to search internal emails and texts, he said a derogatory word for women — the B-word — was used more than 100 times.
"The case is indefensible. They're going to have to pay on it," Hansbrough said. "...They have no respect for disability and employment law."
'Covid changed a lot'
"It's an unusual set of circumstances," employment attorney Matthew Besser said. "It certainly raises questions as a taxpayer."
Besser is not involved in Curry's case.
However, he said the law requires employers — including government entities — to provide reasonable accommodations to employees with disabilities so they can successfully perform their jobs.
Reasonable accommodations are modifications to the job that allow an employee to perform the job's basic functions, Besser said.
The accommodations can include part-time work, reassignment or making a bathroom accessible, he said.
Besser said workplace accommodations are increasingly a request for remote work.
"COVID changed a lot," said Besser. "Before employers would often say, 'We can't possibly allow employees to work remotely.' Then, after COVID, we learned that we can."
Besser said a doctor's note doesn't automatically require employers to provide a reasonable accommodation to an employee. However, it triggers an interactive process about the employee's request, and employers can only deny requests when there is undue hardship, which is a high bar for the employer.
"When you've got a current employee, it behooves everybody to see if there's some way to make it out," he said. "It's not good for anybody to be in ongoing litigation."
'People don't understand'
Curry's job is done primarily by phone and is currently a hybrid role.
"Cuyahoga County knows they can give her the accommodation of working from home and protecting her," Hansbrough said.
"They've said they'll only give it to her if she settles her lawsuit. They're using her health and safety as leverage," he said.
Curry said her current situation has taken a toll.
"It's very hard because people don't understand," she said. "It's not like you have this disability ... people can see."
"I've always felt bad because I never want my co-workers to think I think they stink or they smell," she said. "It has nothing to do with them. It's the type of perfume, the fragrances, whatever is in them and whatever it does to my brain."
You can read the full lawsuit below:
Cuyahoga County's response
News 5 Investigators reached out to Cuyahoga County.
A county spokesperson said, "We do not comment on pending litigation."
