A federal judge has ruled the city of Erie, Pennsylvania, violated federal law by using a physical ability test that eliminated the vast majority of female applicants for police officer positions, according to the Department of Justice.
The court's December 13th ruling followed a four-day trial held in March 2005.
In a lawsuit, the Department of Justice alleged that Erie's use of the physical ability test violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 because, according to the department, it had an unlawful disparate impact against women and did not predict whether an applicant was able to perform the police officer job successfully.
About 87 percent of female applicants failed the test, while only 29 percent of their male counterparts failed it, the court said. The court also found that, after using the test between 1994 and 2004, only about 4 percent of Erie's sworn police officers were women.
Erie's physical ability test consisted of an obstacle course run, followed by a series of push-ups and sit-ups, all of which applicants had to complete in 90 seconds. In the ruling issued this month, the court held that Erie failed to prove that the test was job related. The Department of Justice argued that the addition of the push-ups and sit-ups components to the obstacle course run was not justified.
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