A continuing care retirement / life plan community in Chicago is facing a class action lawsuit alleging that it used a timekeeping system that collected and stored biometric data using employees’ facial geometry.
According to court records, a certified nursing assistant, Bertrand Bayeg, and 366 current or former employees of The Admiral at the Lake allege that the CCRC violated the state’s Biometric Information Privacy Act by using “a system that collected and analyzed employees’ facial geometry without their knowledge or consent and without a policy for the deletion of such data.”
Bayeg claims he did not sign a release allowing The Admiral to collect or store his facial geometry during the time he worked at the CCRC, from September 2017 to January 2019.
In a 2019 lawsuit, The Admiral asserted that its timekeeping system “only took photographs of employees and section 10 of the Act excludes photographs from the definition of ‘biometric identifiers.’ The CCRC argued that the company onyx used the photos to ensure that the person using the timekeeping system matched the identity of the employee. The circuit court denied the CCRC’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit.
Bayeg filed an amended motion for class certification on behalf of himself and the other 366 plaintiffs in November 2022.
“He argued that common questions of law and fact predominated over individual issues since all class members were subjected to the same non-compliant policies,” the Cook County Record reported.
The court agreed with Bayeg and colleagues, leading to an appeal from the retirement community, which contends that the plaintiffs are not eligible for class certification. Upon appeal, the case was decided on June 20 in favor of the plaintiffs.
The appellate court ruled that the only way for the judges to overrule the lower court’s decision would be to find that “a class action is not appropriate.”
“This ruling means that Bertrand Bayeg will represent hundreds of current and former employees in seeking statutory damages for alleged BIPA violations by The Admiral at the Lake,” the Cook County Record reported.
Other senior living and care providers have been the target of lawsuits over the Illinois law in recent years, among them Eagle’s View Supportive Living and Memory Care, Lifespace Communities, the former Capital Senior Living (now known as Sonida Senior Living) and Senior Lifestyle Corp.
