The Equinox $11 million discrimination lawsuit ended in May 2023 when a Manhattan federal jury awarded former personal training manager Röbynn Europe $11.25 million, finding that the luxury gym chain subjected her to race and gender discrimination and maintained a hostile work environment at its Upper East Side location. The award consisted of $10 million in punitive damages and $1.25 million in compensatory damages for emotional distress, plus a separately agreed $16,000 in back pay.1The New York Times. Equinox Settlement Discrimination2CBS News. Equinox Racism Lawsuit Robynn Europe $11.3 Million Award
Who Röbynn Europe Is
Europe is a fitness professional, former professional bodybuilder, and Oberlin College art student who has held a personal trainer certification since 2006.1The New York Times. Equinox Settlement Discrimination Equinox hired her in November 2018 as a fitness manager at its East 61st Street location, then promoted her by the end of December 2018 to personal training manager at the East 92nd Street gym.3Athletech News. Equinox Ordered To Pay $11M in Race Gender Discrimination Lawsuit She was fired in September 2019.
What She Alleged at the 92nd Street Gym
Europe alleged that a white male employee she supervised created a toxic atmosphere by making repeated vulgar comments about the bodies of Black women and objecting to her authority.2CBS News. Equinox Racism Lawsuit Robynn Europe $11.3 Million Award She described what she encountered as “crass, unfiltered expressions of prejudice from male colleagues.”1The New York Times. Equinox Settlement Discrimination
Europe also testified that the hostile environment caused a sudden and dramatic worsening of her bulimia symptoms, requiring intensive treatment.4Crumiller. Equinox Hit With $11.25M Jury Verdict in Race Gender Discrimination Lawsuit
How Complaints Were Handled and How She Was Fired
According to the lawsuit, Europe reported the harassment repeatedly and in person to the general manager, who told her that all complaints had to run through him first, cutting off her access to human resources. She also filed a written complaint after the company honored a client’s request for a white personal trainer. That complaint was ignored, and the client’s request was accommodated anyway.5Fox Rothschild. Equinox Jury Verdict Serves as Cautionary Tale for Employers
Equinox fired Europe in September 2019, citing 47 instances of lateness across her roughly ten months on the job.1The New York Times. Equinox Settlement Discrimination Her lawsuit called that a “thinly-veiled excuse.”4Crumiller. Equinox Hit With $11.25M Jury Verdict in Race Gender Discrimination Lawsuit She said she was never late for client training appointments, regularly stayed past her scheduled hours, and that other employees, including the colleague she had reported, frequently arrived late or left early without discipline.2CBS News. Equinox Racism Lawsuit Robynn Europe $11.3 Million Award
The Verdict and Why the Damages Could Be This Large
Europe filed suit in Manhattan federal court in 2020 as Robynn Europe v. Equinox Holdings, Inc. et al. (Case No. 1:20-cv-07787), alleging racial and gender discrimination, hostile work environment, and retaliation.2CBS News. Equinox Racism Lawsuit Robynn Europe $11.3 Million Award The court dismissed the retaliation and ADA claims at summary judgment, letting only the discrimination and hostile work environment claims under the New York City Human Rights Law reach the jury.5Fox Rothschild. Equinox Jury Verdict Serves as Cautionary Tale for Employers
That statutory choice shaped everything about the damages. Federal Title VII caps combined compensatory and punitive damages at $300,000 for the largest employers.6EEOC. Remedies for Employment Discrimination The NYCHRL has no such cap, and New York’s Court of Appeals has held that federal statutes serve as a floor rather than a ceiling for the city law, with a punitive damages standard deliberately less stringent than Title VII’s malice-or-reckless-indifference test.7Seyfarth Shaw. New York Court of Appeals Establishes Standard for Punitive Damages Under NYCHRL
On May 16, 2023, a jury of five women and three men returned the $11.25 million verdict.4Crumiller. Equinox Hit With $11.25M Jury Verdict in Race Gender Discrimination Lawsuit The $10 million punitive figure sits at an 8-to-1 ratio to the compensatory award, just under the informal single-digit threshold the U.S. Supreme Court has signaled for due-process review of punitive awards.
Equinox’s Response and the Fight Over Remittitur
Equinox said after the verdict that it “vehemently disagreed” with the finding and does not “tolerate discrimination in any form.”1The New York Times. Equinox Settlement Discrimination The company filed post-trial motions asking the court to vacate the verdict, order a new trial on damages, or reduce the award. Its counsel at Jackson Lewis argued the jury had been “guided by sympathy and emotion,” had “erroneously” credited Europe’s claims of racial animus, and issued “extreme, unconscionable damages.”8Law360. Equinox Rips Unconscionable $11.3M Verdict in Bias Trial A magistrate judge was ordered to oversee settlement discussions.2CBS News. Equinox Racism Lawsuit Robynn Europe $11.3 Million Award
The prospect that a judge could cut the jury’s award, through the process called remittitur, has since become its own dispute. Europe’s legal team at the Crumiller firm publicly criticized remittitur as a practice that “retraumatizes plaintiffs and disincentivizes employers to take workplace discrimination claims seriously, because they know that a high jury award will almost certainly be reduced.” Accepting the Courageous Plaintiff award at the National Employment Lawyers Association/New York gala in November 2023, Europe said that “mere minutes after this incredible victory, I was required to put a new number on what I’d endured.”9Crumiller. Robynn Europe Courageous Plaintiff NELA-NY
Europe and Crumiller have backed New York legislation that would sharply limit judges’ power to reduce jury awards in employment discrimination cases, barring courts from disturbing a verdict absent “exceptional circumstances” involving partiality, prejudice, mistake, or corruption. The bill passed the New York State Senate in March 2026 by a vote of 40–22 and is currently in an Assembly committee.10New York State Senate. S410
Other Complaints Against Equinox
Europe’s case is not the only recent discrimination claim against the chain. In February 2022, former senior director of corporate accounts Jaime Piccolo filed an EEOC complaint alleging she was fired after requesting work-from-home accommodations for childcare during the pandemic, and describing a pervasive “misogynistic bro culture” with harassment by more than half a dozen male managers over her two-decade career there. Two other employees filed suit in 2020 alleging gender, pay, pregnancy, and caregiver discrimination, and at least two lawsuits have been brought over the conduct of a former regional director who was eventually allowed to resign with a substantial severance package despite multiple allegations of sexual harassment.11Business Insider. Former Equinox Employee Harassment Discrimination Complaint EEOC Equinox is also the subject of a nationwide EEOC investigation into discrimination based on childcare responsibilities.12Wigdor Law. Piccolo Filed EEOC Charge The company has said it takes misconduct seriously and requires employees to uphold values of “respect, diversity and inclusion.”