Last June, a federal jury in Camden New Jersey said a white Starbucks manager had been scapegoated for a racially-charged and widely publicized incident and determined that the coffee mega-chain needed to pay its former employee $25.6 million for the way it treated her.
The case was unusual for several reasons, not least of which was the fact that the verdict included $25 million in punitive damages, even though the two Black men—whose 2018 wrongful arrest at a Philadelphia Starbucks had sparked the controversy—previously settled their claims against the company for a symbolic $1 and a promise that the company would set up a $200,000 program for young entrepreneurs. But, the case also hinged on once-rarely seen claims of reverse discrimination.
