When Carlen Loyal, a black employee of the Bartow County Road Department, received a racist text message from a white co-worker he could hardly have predicted that he, and his brother-in-law, would be the ones fired by their employer.

Filing a lawsuit last week, the US Justice Department (DoJ) allege that Bartow County, Georgia subjected Loyal to a racially hostile work environment, retaliated against fellow black employee Bobby Turner, and terminated both men under spurious circumstances.