A woman who worked as a maid at Jeff Bezos’ mansion is suing the billionaire. She claims to have contracted a urinary tract infection several times because the boss did not provide the employees with a halfway barrierfree bathroom.
According to the Jezebel website, which had access to the documents from the trial, Mercedes Wedaa accuses the Amazon founder of exposing her to unsafe and unhealthy working conditions.
Mercedes worked for a year and a half at the billionaire’s Seattle home as a housekeeper, meaning she ran a team of domestic workers. The lawsuit is against Jeff Bezos himself and two thirdparty companies that manage his properties, Northwestern LLC and Zefram LLC.
Both Mercedes and other employees had to climb out of a window, through an underground engine room, and down a ladder to get to the only available bathroom, which was shared with male maintenance staff.
After complaining about the lack of a suitable place, employees were ordered to use the security team’s toilet, which was located in the surveillance room. However, the guards themselves refused entry, claiming it would violate security protocols.
As a result of the lack of access to a bathroom, not only Mercedes, but several female employees “frequently developed a urinary tract infection,” the document says.
According to information in the document, the former employee also claims that she worked 14hour shifts, often without lunch breaks, and that she was racially discriminated against because she is Latino. According to the document, Bezos treated Hispanic employees differently from whites and ordered maids to “serve the family without being seen.”
To which the billionaire responded that “I could never be racist” since his girlfriend Lauren Sanchez is of Mexican descent.
It’s not the first time that Bezos has been accused of putting his workers in inhumane conditions. Last year, a labor scandal at Amazon exposed a series of abuses suffered by employees. A common practice in the company was Urinating in bottles to meet delivery deadlines.