Former Lions Employees Suing Team with Claims of Racial, Age Discrimination

Former Detroit Lions employees Michael Richardson and Robert Yanagi are suing the team and "claiming racial and age discrimination ultimately led to them getting fired," according to Kirkland Crawford of the Detroit Free Press.

Richardson, 52, served as an assistant video director for the Lions, while Yanagi, 58, was the team's video operations director. Richardson is African American, while Yanagi is of Japanese descent.  

Per that report, Richardson filed a workers' compensation claim on Dec. 10, 2017, after injuring his shoulder and nine days later filed a complaint to human resources alleging "racist comments by an employee in the Detroit Lions Scouting Department and disparate treatment by an employee in the Detroit Lions Team Operations Department."

Richardson then reportedly met with general manager Bob Quinn later in December, who "acknowledged Richardson's complaint of race discrimination" but "raised concerns about Richardson's work performance," according to the lawsuit.

Per that report, "Richardson's work evaluation score given to Quinn was 2.8 out of 5, with one of the employees Richardson complained about giving him a score of 1 in every category."

Yanagi also reportedly told the team's human resources that Quinn "treated him differently because of his race and therefore he was concerned about losing his job."

According to Dave Birkett of the Detroit Free Press, the two men are "seeking damages in excess of $25,000." Both Richardson and Yanagi were fired in January and replaced with Erik Kunttu, who had served as Syracuse's director of video operations while new head coach Matt Patricia was a graduate assistant at the school from 2001-03.

"There were comments made about both of my clients in regards to their race," Angela Mannarino, the attorney for Richardson and Yanagi, told Birkett. "It was commonplace for comments to be made of that nature and that's why Michael went to HR and made the complaint about what was going on because it made him very uncomfortable. And then Robert supported his complaint, supported what he was saying, and then shortly thereafter they're both out the door."

The NFL has also been named as a defendant in the case.