A federal judge approved a subpoena allowing the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to proceed with its age discrimination investigation of Aerotek Inc., the EEOC announced Wednesday.

An EEOC investigation of the staffing provider found hundreds of age-based employee referral requests from Aerotek clients across the country, according to the EEOC. The subpoena sought portions of Aerotek’s employee referral database from 62 of the company’s locations where the requests were documented.

The EEOC reported Aerotek had refused to provide it with the names and contact information of its clients and employees. The EEOC had then asked the court to order Aerotek to produce this information, and a judge ruled in the EEOC’s favor on Feb. 18. Aerotek asked the judge to alter the decision, but the request was denied on March 20.

“Staffing agencies work hand-in-hand with their clients to hire, assign and place employees, and if discriminatory requests are made or honored, then both the staffing agency and the client are susceptible to EEOC investigation,” said Julianne Bowman, acting director of the EEOC’s Chicago District Office. “This is a very important ruling because staffing agencies, just like any other employer, have a duty to make employment decisions in a non-discriminatory manner. Once the EEOC has identified a potential violation of the law, it has the authority to further investigate that issue to see if there are more violations at the company.”

EEOC Chicago Regional Attorney John Hendrickson added, “Just two years ago the Seventh Circuit ordered Aerotek to comply with an EEOC subpoena in a separate investigation. (EEOC v. Aerotek, Inc., No. 11-1349 (7th Cir. Jan. 11, 2013)). Apparently, Aerotek did not get the message, as it once again refused to comply fully with an EEOC subpoena. Aerotek has spent years fighting the EEOC, and where has it gotten the company? The same place it would have been had it not fought the agency. Employers should take a lesson from this case — noncompliance with an EEOC subpoena doesn’t pay.”