Judge Upholds $4.5M Verdict against Massachusetts City

A Massachusetts Superior Court judge has upheld a $4.5 million verdict against Cambridge for retaliating against a city employee who filed a discrimination complaint.

Judge Bonnie McLeod-Mancuso said in her decision that City Manager Robert Healy and other city employees engaged in a “deliberate, systematic campaign to punish the plaintiff.”

Malvina Monteiro, who is Cape Verdean, filed a gender and race discrimination complaint in 1998 and was fired in 2003. A jury last May found in favor of Monteiro, former director of Cambridge’s police review board.

Joan Lukey, a lawyer for the city, tells The Boston Globe the judge’s decision was “disappointing.”

Ellen Zucker, who represented Monteiro, called the decision “soundly reasoned and grounded in what happened at trial.”

Information from: The Boston Globe