The family of a Walmart employee in Illinois who died of coronavirus complications filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the company on Monday, alleging that managers failed to enforce measures that would protect him from the virus and turned a blind eye to his symptoms. Wando Evans, 51, was an overnight stock and maintenance worker at the Evergreen Park, Illinois store for 15 years. The suit alleges that Walmart managers failed to inform other employees that Evans may have been infected with the virus after he was exhibiting symptoms. When Evans was eventually sent home on March 23, he was found dead two days later. His co-worker who was also exhibiting COVID-19 symptoms, Phillip Thomas, died six days after him.
“For weeks, my brother and his coworkers worked at Walmart without masks or gloves while thousands of customers came in every day. There was no enforced social distancing at the time and inadequate paid leave to make sure people weren’t going to work sick,” said Evans’ sister, Angela McMiller, in a statement. Walmart said it was ramping up its cleaning and sanitizing measures after the two deaths of its workers.
