a case for racial discrimination?

[bisto]

What is the name of your state? California.

I am a manager of a small company. The company is made up of 3 Hispanics, 3 Caucasions ( 1 being me, 1 the owner ), 2 Asians and 1 African American.
My problem is I hired the African American 2 months ago on a 3 month probation period. I want to terminate his employment for various reasons including logging time I know he did not work, giving false information on his resume, etc. I spoke to him and he said the only reason he was being fired was based on his race- not his incompedence.
Because it was the owner and manager firing him, who are both white, does he have any case of racial discrimination?
We backed down and he is still here because the points we brought forward were my points and there were not any other people to witness these instances. I am the one who let him leave early for personal reasons but now he is claiming he worked. So it is his word versus mine. What can I do? I understand that while on probation he does need to be given a reason for his termination, but we agve him 8 instances for what we believe were firable offences.
Thanks.

 

[cbg]

Unless he can point to people of other races who committed the exact same offenses while in their probation period and were not fired, he has no case for racial discrimination.

You did not do yourself any favors by backing down, by the way. Now he's learned that he can get away with whatever he wants by playing the race card, and you'll let him get away with it.

Document everything that has transpired in his file, if you haven't done so already. If you haven't already cut yourself off from doing so, let him know that he's on a last chance warning, and that the next time anything happens, he's out on his ear. DON'T BACK DOWN NEXT TIME.

BTW, unless you are a public utility, nothing in the law says that you do or do not have to give him a reason for the termination regardless of whether he's in his probation period or not. That's not to say that being honest about it isn't a good idea (for one thing, if you give them a reason they're less likely to assume it's because of their race, and also protects you to a certain extent in any suit he may attempt to bring). But it's not mandatory.

 

[Dandy Don]

All the reasons you have mentioned are justifiable. He just used a false claim of alleged discrimination to try to intimidate you, but it will not work.

 

[chrisdizz22]

i would definatly fire now that he tried to pull the race card- when it had nothing to do with race