Four D.C. area workers are suing D.C.’s Department of Employment Services, accusing the agency of denying or seizing their unemployment benefits with little to no explanation, leaving them financially strapped and without answers during the pandemic.
The complaint, filed in D.C. Superior Court today by the Legal Aid Society of D.C. and Alston & Bird LLP, names DOES Director Unique Morris-Hughes, Mayor Muriel Bowser, and the D.C. government as defendants. It alleges the city department “systematically” violated D.C. workers’ rights by depriving them of their full benefits without offering an opportunity for claimants to contest or determine why their payments had been denied, reduced, or delayed.
Plaintiffs are seeking back payments for benefits they didn’t receive, plus a permanent injunction that would require the agency to provide a written rationale for benefit denials, terminations, or reductions, and grant claimants an opportunity to appeal those decisions.
Spokespeople for DOES did not immediately return a text message or email seeking comment.
William Perry, a 63-year-old D.C. resident who lays brick for a living, says he filed a claim for unemployment benefits shortly after his employer laid him off due to COVID-19 in June 2020. He heard little from DOES until nine months later, in March 2021, when the agency informed him that his claim had been denied because he hadn’t earned enough money to qualify for benefits. Perry contested the decision, but gave up in...
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