Larry Phillips loves children. So much so, the 46-year-old Baptist from Independence, Mo., dedicated himself to a low-paying career helping the most abused, neglected and forgotten kids find a safe haven while the judicial system decided their fate.
What Phillips didn’t expect was a battle with an office supervisor, who described himself in a newspaper interview as an “in-your-face queer who gets angrier everyday.”
As a social worker for the Missouri Department of Social Services, Phillips was in charge of interviewing abused children and finding them quality foster care homes in which to live while the judicial system decided their fate.
Last fall, he sued his employer for discrimination and won $86,000 in damages and attorney fees. Another trial was scheduled the week of April 24 to consider three more counts of discrimination Phillips has raised against his former employer.
Phillips is represented by the American Center for Law and Justice, Virginia Beach, Va.
“My work environment was totally bizarre,” Phillips told Baptist Press.
“The supervisor in question was very anti-heterosexual and wanted everyone to know it, and wanted everyone to agree with him and his work strategies to encourage children to at least experiment with homosexual sex,” he said. “I could not abide by this, especially from a state office charged with protecting already abused, traumatized children who already were at their most vulnerable point.”
In October 1999, Phillips won a lawsuit charging his employer with discrimination based on his religious beliefs.
A judge recently upheld the jury’s decision, turning down an appeal of the trial by the state.
Phillips was awarded $26,000 in actual and punitive damages and $60,000 in attorney fees. (BP)
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