(LEGAFI) -- A job applicant who was denied employment because he was convicted of killing a man three decades ago has won a discrimination lawsuit settlement with the staffing agency that denied him the job.

According to the man’s employment discrimination lawsuit, Integrity Staffing Solutions of Allentown, Pennsylvania, violated the federal Civil Rights Act when it denied him a job at Amazon.com’s warehouse in Breinigsville because of his criminal record.

“Employment policies that impose a blanket exclusion on people with past convictions, without any consideration of the relationship of the conviction to the job in question, can constitute unlawful discrimination," Jennifer Clarke, executive director of the Public Interest Law Center of Philadelphia, said in a press release.

The nonprofit law center helped the man file the employment discrimination lawsuit, which explains why denying an applicant employment based on their criminal record violates the law:

"While such policies are facially neutral, they produce severe disparate impact on racial minorities, including African-American, Native Americans and Latinos, because of the significantly higher rates of criminal convictions experienced by these populations."

In Pennsylvania alone, the incarceration rate for African Americans is nine times that of whites, according to the employment discrimination lawsuit.

The lawsuit describes the man as “a model citizen” since his conviction in the early 1980s. According to the lawsuit, he was convicted of shooting a man who had threatened him and his family. Upon his release, the man went on to earn a bachelor’s degree and work for 23 years for GE/Lockheed Martin, where he was required to maintain security clearances from the federal government. He also raised two children after his wife died in 1991.

In addition to the undisclosed monetary settlement, Integrated Staffing Solutions "has reaffirmed its policy of providing equal employment opportunity for people with past criminal convictions" and "also has further reemphasized to supervisors and personnel engaged in the hiring process the importance of and appropriate review of a job applicant's criminal convictions,” according to the Public Interest Law Center’s press release.