Legal Question in Employment Law in California

Re: Is this discrimination?

Statistics alone are not enough to prove discrimination. For example, if the employer were to show that the 3 Black employees were less qualified or performing more poorly than the employees retained, they would have no case.

Re: Is this discrimination?

You have identified what is referred to as a "disparate impact" case. Clearly, the stastics would indicate that Blacks were disparately impacted by the lay-off, from which one could infer that they were impermissibly discriminated against.

However, the employer would have the right to present a legitimate business reason why those three employees were chosen for lay-off (e.g., consistently poor performance reviews; their department was eliminated, etc.). Then the employees would have to prove with evidence that the alleged business reason was really a pretext for a discriminatory intent. That's a very difficult case to prove, particularly where there are other minorities that continue to be gainfully employed and treated fairly at the company.

Good luck.