Ex-employee sues KC Boilermakers union for sex discrimination, workplace retaliation
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- Ashley Bathory sued the Boilermakers union, alleging sex discrimination and retaliation.
- She says she was demoted with a $15,000 pay cut in January 2025 and fired in April 2025.
- Bathory seeks back pay, future lost wages and benefits and damages for emotional distress.
A former International Brotherhood of Boilermakers employee is suing the Kansas City-based union, alleging sex and gender discrimination and retaliation under the Missouri Human Rights Act.
Ashley Bathory, who worked at the union’s headquarters, alleges she was demoted after a male employee was placed in a supervisory role she previously held and that her complaints about discrimination were met with adverse actions, including termination.
Filed Thursday in Platte County Circuit Court, the lawsuit demands a jury trial and asks for back pay, compensation for future lost wages and benefits and damages for emotional distress, humiliation and inconvenience.
A Boilermakers spokesperson did not respond Friday to a request for comment. Bathory’s attorneys, Kevin Koc and Alex von Keudell, declined to comment.
The lawsuit emerges as four former union members — including ousted International President Newton Jones — are in the midst of a weekslong federal racketeering trial in which they’re accused of embezzling millions from the union for their own benefit.
Closing arguments in the trial are scheduled for Monday in the U.S. District Court in Kansas City, Kansas.
Received progressive promotions over 16 years
According to the lawsuit, Bathory began working as a bookkeeper for the Boilermakers in January 2008 and received progressive promotions over more than 16 years with the union. She was promoted to accountant around October 2012, the lawsuit says, to accounting supervisor in August 2019 and to accounting manager in the union’s international secretary-treasurer’s office in April 2024.
Bathory’s job required her to handle accounting, payroll, reporting and related financial responsibilities for the union, the lawsuit says.
The union’s most recent annual report filed with the Department of Labor, which covers the fiscal year ending June 30, 2025, lists Bathory as a payroll specialist with an annual salary of $98,827.
“Before the events giving rise to this lawsuit, Plaintiff had not been subjected to documented progressive discipline, a performance improvement plan, or a warning that her employment was in jeopardy for poor performance,” the suit says.
In late 2024, the lawsuit alleges, the union “hired or placed” a male employee “in or around the Accounting Department.”
Bathory was excluded from the man’s interview process even though she normally participated in such interviews, the lawsuit says. She was told she would supervise the new employee but wasn’t provided details about his role, skills or purpose in the accounting department.
After his arrival, the lawsuit says, the union increasingly communicated with the new male hire instead of Bathory about accounting department issues. At the end of January 2025, the suit alleges, Bathory was called into a meeting with Clint Penny, the union’s international secretary-treasurer.
Demoted in early 2025
Penny told her she was being demoted and that she would have a $15,000 pay reduction, the suit says.
“Before the demotion,” it says, “Plaintiff had not received notice of a disciplinary review or fair warning that her employment was in jeopardy for poor performance.”
About the time of her demotion, the lawsuit says, the union placed the new male employee into supervisory roles that Bathory had previously held. The decisions “occurred within a predominately male leadership structure,” the suit alleges.
“Plaintiff believed the demotion was motivated by her sex/gender,” it says. “Plaintiff further believed Defendant was moving her out of a supervisory role so that a male employee could oversee or assume responsibilities within the Accounting Department.”
Bathory filed an internal complaint with the union in early March 2025, the lawsuit says, alleging that her demotion was based on sex/gender discrimination. On March 18, 2025, it says, she filed a charge of discrimination with the Missouri Commission on Human Rights and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
Fired after filing discrimination charge
Bathory was fired in early April 2025, the lawsuit says — 35 days after her internal complaint and about 20 days after filing her MCHR/EEOC discrimination charge.
“Defendant’s stated reason at the time of termination was that Plaintiff’s services were no longer needed,” the lawsuit says. “Defendant later shifted or expanded its explanation by claiming Plaintiff was terminated for alleged performance issues, including alleged continued mistakes and uncooperativeness after she filed her March 18, 2025, charge.”
In attempting to rationalize her termination, the lawsuit says, the union “used the period after Plaintiff’s discrimination complaint and administrative charge to scrutinize, reinterpret, and repackage alleged performance issues that had already been known to Defendant and already used to justify Plaintiff’s demotion.”
Many of the issues the union cited against Bathory, the lawsuit says, “arose during periods when Defendant’s financial operations were affected by institutional problems outside Plaintiff’s control.”
The lawsuit also alleges that the union did not impose comparable discipline on other Boilermakers employees who made similar accounting or administrative errors. And, it says, “Defendant treated Plaintiff more harshly than similarly situated employees who had not complained of discrimination and/or were outside Plaintiff’s protected class.”
According to the lawsuit, the union’s anti-discrimination and anti-retaliation policy prohibits retaliation against employees for lodging a discrimination or harassment complaint or assisting in the investigation of such a complaint.
“Despite that policy,” the lawsuit says, “Defendant terminated Plaintiff shortly after she complained of discrimination and filed an administrative charge.”
