A former staffer for Democratic lawmakers in Arizona was awarded $1 million in a gender and racial discrimination case after she was fired for questioning why her compensation and benefits were less than her white counterpart.

The Arizona Republic reported Tuesday that Talonya Adams was relieved of her duties as a policy adviser in the state Senate's Democratic caucus in February 2015, around the time when she started questioning her salary as it correlates to her assignments.

"Plaintiff learned that male non-African American counterparts at work received substantially higher salaries and salary increases," the formal suit filed by Adams, who represented herself in the dispute, said. According to the news site, Adams was an employee of then-Senate minority leader Katie Hobbs, who currently serves as Arizona's secretary of state.

The complaint adds that while the job commitments did not differ from those colleagues, Adams "had a heavier workload and the more challenging committee assignments."

After Adams became the only aide to be denied a salary increase and noticed discrepancies in vacation days, she addressed her grievances with Democratic leadership and staffers. Per Arizona Capital Times, a sister outlet of the publication published incomes of all state Senate employees and Adams discovered she earned almost $30,000 less than a white employee with identical committee duties. While traveling to Seattle to care for her child who had fallen ill, Adams was fired by Hobbs and Minority Chief of Staff Jeff Winkler.

Adams appealed the decision in federal court, stating her former employer was in breach of the federal Civil Rights Act. An attorney for the state Senate argued that she couldn't compare the pay of Adams with Republican colleagues, even if their jobs titles were similar because "the majority caucus pays differently than the minority caucus."

That wasn't enough to convince the eight-person jury, who decided Friday to reward Adams $1 million in compensatory reparations. Adams could be granted more at a punitive damages hearing scheduled for August 14. 

"When she did her closing statement, she didn’t ask for a specific dollar amount," Gillmore Bernard, a Phoenix-based attorney who assisted Adams with her dispute, said following the decision. "What she asked for was an amount that was fair and that would send a message to the other side, and I think the jury really came back and did that."

As for moving forward on equal pay conversations, the Arizona Senate confirmed they would adjust salaries to ensure employees are compensated based on their experience. 

Arizona-SenateRacial discriminationTalonya-Adams