Danish
A former warehouse worker’s federal civil-rights lawsuit is putting a spotlight on conditions inside HD Supply’s GA02 Forest Park distribution center, alleging that a Black forklift operator was denied the same safety net and second chances extended to non-Black colleagues. According to the federal complaint in Hall v. HD Supply, Inc., Quinton J. Hall says a forklift battery incident in summer 2024 left him with a serious back injury—and triggered a sequence of decisions that sidelined his career, magnified his pain, and punished him for speaking up about race discrimination and unsafe equipment. The case, Quinton Hall vs. HD Supply, seeks at least 50 million dollars in damages and frames the dispute as a test of how one of the country’s largest industrial distributors treats Black workers who raise concerns about both safety and civil rights.
Forklift battery incident at GA02
According to court documents, Hall alleges that on June 27, 2024, a forklift battery at HD Supply’s GA02 Forest Park facility began to overheat, smoke, and ultimately erupt, filling part of the warehouse with fumes and forcing him to deploy multiple fire extinguishers to control the situation. He says the incident left him disoriented and with what he describes as a permanent back injury, a turning point that transformed a once-stable job into a fight over HD Supply workplace safety, medical restrictions, and equal treatment on the warehouse floor. According to the federal complaint, Hall contends that managers quickly recognized the severity of what happened—one supervisor allegedly told him he had done all he could and expressed relief he was not more seriously hurt—yet the company’s actions in the weeks that followed undercut that acknowledgement.
Hall alleges that HD Supply delayed routing him to full medical evaluation while awaiting drug-test results and then refused to align his assignments with the back limitations documented by outside providers. Instead of reducing his workload, the complaint says GA02 leadership reassigned him to “put-away” duties requiring him to push and pull a manual pallet jack weighing an estimated 150 to 200 pounds through warehouse aisles, work he characterizes as the opposite of light duty and incompatible with his injury. According to the filing, Hall argues this decision did more than slow his recovery; he says it converted a treatable injury into long-term damage and laid the groundwork for the broader HD Supply workplace safety lawsuit now pending in the Northern District of Georgia.
Alleged racial disparities in light-duty work
The core of Quinton Hall vs. HD Supply is the claim that GA02 was not just unsafe, but unequal—and that race made a measurable difference in who received protection when they got hurt. According to the federal complaint, Hall alleges that comparable non-Black coworkers who reported injuries or limitations were moved into an enclosed area known as “the cage,” where duties were lighter and more controlled, while he was denied similar assignments despite documented back restrictions. Hall contends that the difference was not subtle: he says he collected video and social-media clips that show named coworkers performing light-duty cage work while he continued to pull heavy loads on the floor, even after HD Supply had his medical records and disability notices in hand.
According to court documents, Hall frames this treatment as race-based disparate treatment under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and 42 U.S.C. § 1981, arguing that the company’s willingness to accommodate non-Black employees but not him supports an inference of HD Supply racial discrimination. The complaint points to his prior performance record—including internal awards and positive evaluations—as context, asserting that nothing in his history justified a sudden refusal to accommodate once he became both injured and outspoken about safety and race. Hall also alleges a pattern of unequal rule enforcement, claiming that after he raised concerns, supervisors began scrutinizing his conduct while overlooking similar or more serious behavior by coworkers outside his protected class.
ADA, disability, and retaliation claims
Beyond race, Hall positions Quinton Hall vs. HD Supply as an ADA case, arguing that GA02 management failed to meet basic obligations to a worker with a documented back injury. According to the federal complaint, he asserts that his orthopedist issued a permanent partial disability notice and that treating providers, including a psychologist, documented both physical and mental-health impacts tied to the forklift battery event. Hall claims HD Supply failed to engage in the interactive process required under the Americans with Disabilities Act, refused reasonable accommodations like light-duty cage assignments, and retaliated when he requested protections or opposed disability-based discrimination.
The filing alleges that, instead of problem-solving, some supervisors responded with hostility, accusing him of “faking” or exaggerating his injury and repeating that claim to coworkers in a way that, Hall says, both deepened his isolation and damaged his standing in the warehouse. According to court documents, he reported these remarks and broader concerns about an HD Supply hostile work environment to Human Resources, filing internal complaints he kept copies of as part of a growing paper trail. Hall contends that as his complaints and disability documentation accumulated, so did management’s irritation, culminating in a sequence he now characterizes as HD Supply retaliation against a worker who asserted his rights.
July 2024 confrontation and firing
The timeline in Quinton Hall vs. HD Supply compresses sharply in July 2024, when the complaint says workplace tensions at GA02 spiked. According to the federal complaint, Hall describes a July 23 confrontation with a supervisor from another department, after which he again raised concerns about both treatment and safety to company officials. Two days later, on July 25, 2024, HD Supply terminated his employment, citing what the company reportedly labeled an “outburst” during that interaction—an account Hall disputes as inconsistent with the facts and with witness testimony.
Hall alleges that during the termination call, an HD Supply human-resources representative admitted she had not personally witnessed the confrontation and could not specify what he had done wrong, which he presents as evidence that no thorough investigation occurred before the firing. According to court filings, one coworker has provided an affidavit stating he did not observe Hall behaving aggressively or disrespectfully during the incident and reporting that a supervisor had earlier vowed Hall would “get what’s coming,” a remark Hall says ties his termination to his protected complaints rather than to any genuine misconduct. The lawsuit argues that HD Supply used the disputed confrontation as a pretext to remove a Black employee who had called out race discrimination, an HD Supply unsafe warehouse, and failures to honor disability protections.
Hostile environment, defamation, and alleged safety patterns
According to the federal complaint, Hall accuses HD Supply of tolerating a hostile work environment at GA02 after his injury, citing what he describes as repeated hostile confrontations, inconsistent discipline, and comments implying he was lying about his pain. He claims one or more supervisors made false statements that he was faking or exaggerating his back problems and shared those accusations with other employees, fueling rumors that left him stigmatized in a workplace where he had once been seen as a strong performer. Those alleged statements, Hall contends, form the basis of a defamation claim under Georgia law, layered on top of his race and disability counts.
Safety concerns extend beyond the June 27 forklift battery incident itself. According to court documents and related coverage of Quinton Hall vs. HD Supply, Hall says he and other workers documented ongoing smoke and heat issues with forklift batteries and charging equipment, including images of high temperature readings and incident reports filed after he left the company. The complaint asserts that this trail of safety complaints, photos, videos, and internal reports supports his claim that GA02 functioned as an HD Supply unsafe warehouse and that management failed to address mounting red flags even as it pushed him out.
Evidence, damages, and national implications
According to the federal complaint, Hall plans to support his allegations with a substantial evidentiary record: internal awards and evaluations, medical and psychological records, disability notices, at least seventeen to twenty coworker affidavits, safety complaints, incident reports, and comparator evidence illustrating how non-Black workers were assigned to cage-based light duty while he was not. He has also compiled a detailed job-search log that, he says, tracks more than 300 applications submitted since his July 2024 termination, documenting ongoing unemployment he attributes to the combined effects of his injury, firing, and reputational damage. The lawsuit requests a jury trial and seeks back pay, front pay, policy changes, training at HD Supply, and an award of not less than 50 million dollars in economic, emotional-distress, and punitive damages, subject to statutory limits and proof at trial.
The allegations land against the backdrop of HD Supply’s national footprint: a company founded in 1974 that now markets HD Supply HVAC systems, HD Supply flooring, HD Supply appliances, and a wide range of HD Supply facility maintenance products through dozens of HD Supply locations and its HD Supply online shopping platform. While HD Supply promotes HD Supply net 30 trade-credit accounts and a steady stream of openings on its HD Supply careers portal, Hall’s case asks a different question: whether the HD Supply GA02 Forest Park warehouse matched the safety-first, equal-opportunity image projected in company materials. At this stage, the federal court has not ruled on the merits, and HD Supply has not publicly filed its detailed response in the docket; the allegations in Quinton Hall vs. HD Supply remain just that—allegations—until the litigation process runs its course.
