If you had any doubts about whether an employer had to comply with a U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) request for information regarding a discrimination complaint, take a look at what happened to an employer that allegedly didn't comply.
The EEOC issued two administrative subpoenas to a healthcare provider after it failed to produce information and testimony the EEOC requested. The EEOC got a judge to issue a “writ of body attachment” for the business owner after he failed to comply with those subpoenas and then not obeying a court order relating to those subpoenas.
The business owner was in the custody of the United States Marshals Service on September 10, 2009.United States Marshals then escorted him an appearance before a federal judge on the same day. At a hearing, the judge gave him until September 24, 2009, to comply with the subpoenas or be at risk of being placed in custody again.
“Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 expressly provides the EEOC with the authority to issue subpoenas during its administrative investigations and to obtain court enforcement when necessary,” says John Hendrickson, regional attorney for the EEOC in Chicago . “The federal courts almost always summarily enforce EEOC subpoenas and require prompt production of the material sought. Employers who choose to defy federal court orders do so, as this case demonstrates, at their peril.”