Five former employees at the Register of Wills are suing the Philadelphia department and its officeholder for discrimination, a new court filing shows.
John Sabatina, the elected official overseeing the agency, allegedly fired 19 staffers of color who supported his opponent and replaced them with white workers, the filing claims. The lawsuit against the department and Sabatina, a Democrat who took office in January, was filed Sept. 6 with the District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
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The five employees in the suit, four Black and one Arabic, all started working at the office between 2020 and 2023 and were terminated, effective Jan. 9. Since January, the workers said they haven't found work with better pay or benefits than they received at the city agency, which probates wills and provides assistance when a person dies without a legal document in place detailing how to distribute assets.
The Register of Wills office declined to comment, and the plaintiffs' attorney did not respond to a request for comment.
Former Register of Wills Tracey Gordon, who took office in 2019, also faced a similar lawsuit when five former employees sued her after they were allegedly fired for not donating to her campaign. So far, the city has paid $125,000 in settlement to two former employees in these suits, and Gordon still faces three more suits, Axios reported.
Gordon narrowly lost the election in November and then ran an unsuccessful Democratic primary campaign against U.S. Rep. Dwight Evans for his seat in April.
Last year, Sabatina ran his campaign with a priority of ending corruption in the Register of Wills office. He told the Committee of Seventy he planned to "restore public trust in the office after four years of corruption, poor hiring & firing practices, and terrible customer service to the citizens of Philadelphia."