2 coaches of Chivas USA allege team fired them for not being Latino

http://edition.cnn.com ^ | May 30, 2013 | Michael Martinez and Jaqueline Hurtado

[BBell]

Los Angeles (CNN) -- Two former coaches have sued Major League Soccer team Chivas USA, claiming they were fired this year because they are not Latino.

Daniel Calichman and Theothoros Chronopoulos, who worked in the team's "academy," or player development, program, accused team owner Jorge Vergara Madrigal of Mexico of enacting a Latino-only employment policy, according to a lawsuit filed in a Los Angeles County court.

Calichman and Chronopoulos, who are both white, also accused Vergara of implementing a discriminatory practice that was carried over from Chivas de Guadalajara, a pro team in Mexico owned by Vergara that allegedly has hired only Mexican soccer players since 1908.

The two men, both former pros and members of the U.S. national team, are seeking unspecified damages for discrimination, harassment, retaliation and wrongful termination, their attorneys said in a statement Wednesday.

The team fired the two coaches "as part of an ethnocentric policy and practice of discriminating against and terminating non-Mexican and non-Latino employees," the suit alleged.

In an interview in his attorney's office, Calichman recalled a team staff meeting last November.

Vergara "asked everyone who speaks Spanish raise your hand, and there was a group that could not speak Spanish," Calichman said. "The work environment changed, and coaches that could not speak Spanish on the field were wondering, 'Hey, will we be fired because I can't speak Spanish and is it possible?'

"It feels horrible," he said of the alleged discrimination.

The Los Angeles area-based Chivas team, which shares a stadium in Carson with the Los Angeles Galaxy, declined to comment.

"We are not commenting because it's a legal matter," said Christina Maillo-Belda, spokeswoman for Chivas USA.

A co-defendant in the civil suit, the human resources firm Insperity Inc. of Kingwood, Texas, also declined comment on Tuesday's filing.

[BBell]

Wait until the Hispanics are in charge out there.

[nickcarraway]

If they were fired for “not being Latino,” then why were they hired? The owners suddenly found out they weren’t “Latino?”

[tacticalogic]

Maybe they knew they weren’t Latino, but thought they’d convert.

[longtermmemmory]

does a bear poop in the woods.

ironically in FL there is a english constitutional amendment.

[Vendome]

Ustedes No Habla Ethanol, entonses sin compatico con colleaga

Or something like that.

I speak it and read it.

I rarely write it.

[MeganC]

Perfectly consistent with the thinking behind a popular latin motto:

“Por La Raza todo, Fuera de La Raza nada”

[max americana]

They’re not in charge...yet. But, in order to survive here in L.A., you have to be a fag, Jew, democrap, not white or Scientologist. One of the 5 is sufficient enough.

[servo1969]

[Forward the Light Brigade]

Racisim is ugly—but most ugly when former winers use it to defend their own Rasa. I hate Racism! Its awful, its stupid and hateful. The worst racists today are Blacks. All this will only spark the most terrible racism in the form of KKK and other groups who will do more than burn a few crosses and parade around in robes.

[tacticalogic]

Agreed. But it appears to have gone beyond simple genetics. You can’t be Black unless you’re “down with the cause”.

[BBell]

Both coaches joined Chivas USA in August 2011. A year later, Vergara acquired 50% ownership of the team and, with wife Angelica Fuentes, became the team's sole owner, the suit said. He "undertook a systemic effort to reverse what he perceived as the 'Americanization' of Chivas USA and to implement a discriminatory employment practice similar to the ethnocentric 'Mexican only' policy that exists at Chivas de Guadalajara," the lawsuit alleged.

[nickcarraway]

Is that illegal in Mexico?