US files lawsuit claiming Google wouldn't give employee new job following military deployment

NEW YORK, Oct 29 : The US filed a lawsuit on Thursday accusing Google of failing to give an employee his old job back or put him in a similar job after he returned from a year of military leave as a US Army reservist.

According to a complaint filed in Manhattan federal court, Mark Davisson spent 2-1/2 years as a Google key account executive, where he handled accounts for the asset manager BlackRock, hedge fund Bridgewater Associates and the former Credit Suisse.

Upon Davisson's return from leave in May 2023, the Alphabet unit allegedly refused to let Davisson handle any customer accounts, though he kept his pay and title, depriving him of possible career advancement.

The complaint said Google later assigned Davisson to a cloud solutions position that also involved no managing of customer accounts, and fired him in August 2024 as part of a broader workforce reduction.