Riot Games has filed motions that aim to force two employees involved in an ongoing lawsuit against the company into private arbitration, a move the company’s attorney tells Kotaku is in line with clauses in the employees’ employment contracts.
The motions spotted by Kotaku are the latest development in a duo of lawsuits filed against Riot Games within the past six months by past and current employees that accused the company of facilitating gender-based discrimination.
The lawsuits themselves followed a Kotaku story from last year on what several developers from the studio called a toxic workplace environment that resulted in female employees enduring discrimination and harassment.
The attorney representing Riot Games says that the two employees being targeted by the private arbitration motions both agreed to arbitration clauses in their employment contracts. According to the attorney, those clauses dictate that employees must take complaints like the ones raised in the existing lawsuits into private arbitration rather than to a trial.
The lawyer representing the employees meanwhile said in a press release that those motions “only serve to silence the voices of individuals who speak out against such misconduct.”