Amazon Warehouse Worker Fired While Recovering From On-The-Job Injuries, Lawsuit Says

According to the Washington State Department of Labor & Industries, Amazon warehouse workers suffer musculoskeletal injuries injuries at about four times the industry rate.

An Amazon warehouse worker is suing his now former employer after he says he was fired while recovering from surgery to fix hernias he received on the job.

According to The Independent, Las Vegas resident Lashone Brown was fired for “non-attendance” while recovering at home following his surgery to fix two work-related hernias. The civil lawsuit, obtained by the publication, states that while Brown was granted official medical leave for two weeks, Amazon’s automated attendance system misclassified his absences as unexcused. He was “automatically terminated” five days into his two-week recovery.

While Amazon HR allegedly acknowledged the mistake as a department error, the department did not correct it, the lawsuit claims. Brown’s legal team said Amazon used the opportunity to punish him for filing a worker’s compensation claim for the injuries.

According to data from the Washington State Department of Labor & Statistics, Amazon warehouse workers suffer musculoskeletal injuries, which include hernias, at a rate four times that of the rest of the industry.

In a 2024 report by the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, Amazon had “relentless efforts to push workers to move faster and its failure to provide a safe environment results in workers getting injured at extremely high rates.

“Many of these workers live with severe injuries and permanent disabilities because of the company’s insistence on enforcing grueling productivity quotas and its refusal to adequately care for injured workers,” according to the report.

“We’re proud of the progress we’ve made and our commitment to continuously improving, and we were eager to share that progress with the Committee,” Amazon said in a statement regarding the report. “Unfortunately, it’s now clear that this investigation wasn’t a fact-finding mission, but rather an attempt to collect information and twist it to support a false narrative.”

In an email to The Independent about Brown’s lasuit, Amazon Spokesperson Sam Stephenson said the company hadn’t received the lawsuit and couldn’t comment on it.

“The health and safety of our employees and partners is our highest priority, and we take this matter seriously,” Stephenson added.