In her own case, she believes that the management of the Miramar office interfered with her advancement in the inspection service by not properly acknowledging her work as an acting supervisor. "The reason that's important is that there's a listing that goes out all over the nation about who's acting as a supervisor," she explains. "It lets other managers see you in that position. By not affording me that opportunity, the other managers didn't know I had that experience." She viewed this as an intentional derailment of her career.
She discussed her situation with Grey, then the inspector in charge. She claims his response was a knee-jerk support of other managers, lacking any objectivity.
Sherri Cohen
Signed, sealed, and shipped out: Amy Ashley claims she lost her job with the U.S. Postal Inspection Service because of her race and gender
Sherri Cohen
Enrique Gutierrez (left) and Delfin Alvarez can't comment on Amy Ashley's claim of discrimination. Gutierrez, however, dismisses allegations that inspectors aren't treated equally.
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Of Ashley, she declares, "When I worked with Amy, I didn't have any concerns about her competency."
Gutierrez says Fletcher requested and was granted a transfer and that she was treated no differently from other inspectors.
Faye Dowdell, now 51 years old and living in St. Petersburg, was an inspector in Miramar until 1996, when she was terminated. A member of the U.S. Army Reserves, Dowdell had been in a vehicle accident while on reserve duty in New Mexico and injured her neck and back in 1994. Sitting for long periods of time aggravated the condition. Inspection managers, however, transferred her to a division where she was to spend most of her time sitting in a vehicle on surveillance.
"I was working every day," she recalls. "Then they sent me for a fitness-for-duty [physical exam], and the doctor said, 'You can go back to work.' I said that was great, and he seemed surprised I was happy about that." The doctor, to whom the postal service routinely referred employee illness or disability claims, went into his office for a while, then came back out and said he needed to do more tests, which took a few more hours. In the end, he concluded she was unfit for duty. She was shocked that the doctor had changed his mind so quickly. "I guess this doctor does whatever he's told to do," she asserts. She was terminated, she says, based on an inability to pass a physical performance test -- such as lifting so much weight or climbing a ladder -- similar to the one she took upon entering the service. The odd thing, she points out, is that no one ever asked her to perform such a test again. "They don't know whether I can [pass] or not," she says.
Dowdell says she has contended with racism since joining the inspection service in 1985. There's just no room for a black woman who speaks her mind, she says. "It's a very elitist group. They all know that if they get rid of somebody they don't like, they can bring in somebody they do. And as long as they have people there they don't like, they're keeping out some of their cronies."
Dowdell has discussed the possibility of filing a lawsuit using Thomas Romeo, Ashley's attorney, but for now is waiting to see how that suit plays out.
Gutierrez says he wasn't in a management position during this period. Of Dowdell's claims of racism, however, he responds, "That's totally unfounded. I mean, it's ridiculous."
Meanwhile, Ashley recently began receiving unemployment checks -- but only after winning an appeal against the inspection service, which had claimed she wasn't eligible. She promises equal doggedness with her lawsuit. "Others who have gone to court like me have made settlement agreements, but they had confidentiality stipulations," she says. "That's why you never hear about it. I wanted to go public because there's too much going on to stay quiet. I'm not wrong, so I'm going to fight it."
