Talk about a boss you can never please. A worker at a New York car dealership was fired after donating a kidney for her boss.
“She just started treating me horribly, viciously, inhumanly after the surgery,” 47-year-old Debbie Stevens told ABCNews.com. “It was almost like she hired me just to get my kidney.”
Stevens had donated her kidney to a patient in Missouri in August of last year in a multi-patient organ trade that got Jackie Brucia, 61, Stevens’ boss at Atlantic Automotive Group on Long Island, a kidney from a donor in San Francisco.
When Stevens complained about the post-op treatment she received from Brucia, Atlantic Automotive Group transferred her to a dealership 50 miles from her home.
“I decided to become a kidney donor to my boss, and she took my heart,’’ Stevens told the New York Post.
Stevens has filed a complaint against Brucia with the New York State Civil Rights Commission, alleging that Brucia hired her for her kidney, then fired her once she had it.
Stevens had worked for the car dealership in 2009 and 2010 but quit to move to Florida. On a visit back to New York she stopped in at the dealership, Brucia told her about her kidney problem, and Stevens told her that she would be happy to be a donor, Stevens says.
Brucia hired Stevens back within a few weeks of Stevens moving back to New York, Stevens says. In January 2011, Brucia asked her for her kidney.
Stevens is also suing Atlantic Automotive Group.
“Our ultimate goal is to bring this before federal court,” Lenard Leeds, Stevens’ attorney told ABCNews.com. “We’re alleging they discriminated against her for her disability and they retaliated against her when she complained about the harassment.”