The outline of the case was the same as hundreds of others that are processed by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission: worker says boss gives preferential treatment to fellow worker, charges job discrimination based on sex and race. The details, however, were unusual. First, the complaining worker was a white male, the boss a white female and the fellow worker a black female. Second, the employer named in the complaint was the EEOC itself.
Allen Sachsel, a commission attorney, claimed that his supervisor, Evangeline Swift, treated a black female lawyer as second-in-command even...