WASHINGTON (AP) — It started with allegations of hangman's nooses, graffiti and racist comments targeting a handful of black workers at a trucking company warehouse in Chicago Ridge, Ill.

Four years later, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission had turned the case into a major class action lawsuit alleging more than 170 employees of Yellow Transportation Inc. were victims of a racially hostile work environment.

When the company agreed in June to settle the case for $11 million, it became the EEOC's latest victory in a systemic strategy to bring more large-scale bias cases against prominent companies — all in the name of cracking down on discrimination in the workplace.