A former Topeka hospital employee says in a federal civil rights lawsuit that she was taunted and bullied at work because of her race.

Pamela Banks, who is black, filed the lawsuit in a Kansas federal court last month against the St. Francis Health Center. She’s seeking damages and backpay.

St. Francis has declined to answer the newspaper’s questions about the claims.

Banks says she complained to managers about a hostile environment, but that they dismissed the complaints without an investigation.

Banks was an employee of a health services company that placed her in St. Francis in 2012. She says the company removed her from St. Francis in 2014 after St. Francis refused to take action.

___

Associated Press information from: The Topeka Capital-Journal