A fired assembly worker says the automaker questioned her male coworkers about an anonymous tip
A longtime Stellantis assembly worker says the automaker investigated an anonymous sex-for-drugs tip about her by quizzing male coworkers across the plant.
That is one of the central allegations in a lawsuit filed April 21, 2026 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan by Hiawaka Banks, a former Operation Specialist and Assembly Worker at FCA US LLC, the U.S. arm of Stellantis. Banks, who is African American, worked at the company from March 2012 until she was fired on November 25, 2024. Her suit, Banks v. FCA US LLC, No. 2:26-cv-11307, accuses the automaker of race and sex discrimination, harassment, and retaliation under Title VII and Michigan's Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act.
The episode likely to catch the eye of HR leaders involves a meeting Banks says she was called into in May 2024, the day she returned from medical leave. According to the filing, the company told her it had received an anonymous tip the previous December claiming she had offered male coworkers "blunts and $40.00" in exchange for sex. Banks says the company looked into the tip by going around the plant asking her male colleagues whether she had propositioned them, and that she was then questioned about her private sex life in the meeting itself. The fallout, she says, was humiliation, reputational damage, and coworkers who started treating her differently.
The filing traces the...
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