Sexual Harassment Lawyer Blawg

Northeastern State University must submit to discovery in Title VII and Title IX action alleging sexual harassment

May 27, 2022 | by Friedman & Houlding LLP

A federal judge in the Western District of Oklahoma has denied Northeastern State University’s motion to dismiss a former employee’s claims of sexual harassment and retaliation under both Title VII and Title IX, after a coworker allegedly put his hands down her pants.

Deanie Hensley, the plaintiff in the action, worked for NSU in Tahlequah, Oklahoma for approximately 13 years. She alleged in her First Amended Complaint that multiple supervisors and co-workers engaged in sexually inappropriate behavior over that time, including sharing sexual cartoons and remarking on women’s bodies, but Hensley’s complaints resulted in no changes. After her complaint about a particular supervisor resulted in retaliation including stripping Hensley of job duties, she decided to take a position with a contract company that provided the university’s mail services. The joint employment with NSU and this company allowed her to continue working at NSU and using her expertise and familiarity with the NSU campus and personnel. However, Hensley alleges that one of the coworkers who had a habit of making offensive remarks sought her out on the job, then: “reached across the counter and put his hands down her jeans, with the backs of his hands against her stomach. He reached down to her panty line. He then pulled her belt buckle and shook it, commenting on how she had been ‘losing weight.'”

Shaken and traumatized by the assault, Hensley alleges that she complained to NSU campus police. Following even more complaints that the harasser was following Ms. Hensley and approaching near her in violation of a protective order, Hensley alleges in her Complaint that Steven Turner, NSU’s President, threatened the contract company with the loss of its contract if it did not remove Ms. Hensley from the NSU campus. Ms. Hensley alleges the inevitable result of this threat would be that she would lose her job–and that in fact, she did lose her job as a consequence.

A Virginia man alleges that his coworker called him “boy” numerous times and compared him to a monkey–and then handed him a bag of fried chicken as an “apology.”

May 12, 2022 | by Friedman & Houlding LLP

Marcus Staples worked for Advanced Technology Recycling, an electronics de-manufacturing company headquartered in Pontiac, Illinois, with seven locations across the country. In Staples’ Complaint filed in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, he alleges that whenever the company’s project manager was on site, he referred to Staples and Staples’ African-American coworkers as “boy”—while referring to white co-coworkers by their given names. One of Staples’ coworkers has stated under oath that he “was so upset” by the manager’s “offensive racism, I frequently complained to [our supervisor] about it myself. During 2019, I complained to [her] about [the] behavior on approximately a weekly basis, either on my own or with co-workers. She said she would take care of it, but nothing changed to remedy the situation.”

The conduct escalated: Staples alleges that the manager derisively compared him to a monkey, and when Staples was offended and upset, the next day the manager handed him a baggie of fried chicken in front of multiple coworkers as a mocking “apology.”

Staples alleges in his Complaint, and multiple co-workers confirm under oath, that when the manager returned to the worksite after these incidents, he resumed calling Staples and his African-American coworkers “boy” — the same as before. Staples alleges that the company went on to retaliate against him for filing an EEOC charge, baselessly disciplining him. When he refused to work through the EEOC to try to settle the charge [which indicated that Staples planned to sue], Staples alleges ATR fired him.

The ongoing fight for justice against CRST

February 2, 2022 | by Friedman & Houlding LLP

In February 2021, we posted about our clients’ quest for justice in their sexual harassment and retaliation class action against CRST Expedited, Inc. At the time, we were waiting for a decision from the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals.

A lot has happened since then…

The Court decided Plaintiffs’ appeal in this decision. While the Court largely upheld dismissal of Plaintiffs’ claims, it also remanded back to the District Court Plaintiffs’ class retaliation claims for women who were removed from their trucks after reporting sexual harassment after July 2015.

University of Illinois Racial Harassment Suit: Former discrimination investigator testifies that her office was a racially “hostile work environment,” and that her director, Heidi Johnson, was biased against people of color

April 28, 2021 | by Friedman & Houlding LLP

Friedman & Houlding LLP clients Derick Brown, Atiba Flemons, and Jeffrey Taylor, have brought a Class Action suit on behalf of Black employees at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, alleging that the University has a pattern or practice of tolerating racial harassment against its Black employees, and that the office charged with investigating complaints of racial harassment is itself discriminatory in its handling of complaints.

One former Office of Access and Equity (OAE) Investigator, a non-party witness in the lawsuit, testified that she “was working in a hostile work environment,” describing the reasons that she left her employment at OAE (formerly ODEA), the office charged with investigating complaints of harassment and discrimination at the Urbana-Champaign campus. Referring to Director of OAE, Heidi Johnson, the witness testified, “It was my perception and I believe the perception — because it was told to me by other colleagues, that Heidi favored our white colleagues.”

The witness testified that she did not think Director Johnson treated employees of color in OAE equitably, describing Johnson’s indifference on issues concerning diversity and inclusion and personnel actions driven by bias, including stripping away the title of the witness, a person of color, without a stated basis, favoring White employees with less experience for promotions, and issuing the witness with a baseless disciplinary action. This treatment ultimately drove the witness to leave the University of Illinois after working many years as an OAE investigator.

21 Plaintiffs to go to trial against major US military contractor for racial harassment

March 19, 2021 | by Friedman & Houlding LLP

Friedman & Houlding LLP represents 21 African-American Plaintiffs in a lawsuit against Newport News Industrials, a subsidiary of Huntington Ingalls, which builds our Carriers and Subs. Some of our clients are veterans.

Plaintiffs are committed to obtaining justice in their long-running lawsuit alleging a racially hostile work environment. Evidence includes nooses at their workstations when they came to work, racist symbols and graffiti displayed openly throughout their workplace, including on t-shirts, headbands, tattoos, toolboxes and in bathrooms, and racial slurs. Plaintiffs testified that they were menaced with nooses, including by a supervisor, were addressed as “boy,” referred to as “n*gger” and were shown a video of white people dancing to Johnny Rebel singing “N*gger Hatin’ Me,” among other racist behavior. And many allege they were treated differently than their white peers when it came to being monitored. A summary of the conduct the district court found supported Plaintiffs’ right to a jury trial can be found here.

This racism was supported with taxpayer dollars.

Plaintiff alleges harassment based on HIV positive status at Motel 6, and alleges retaliation at M6Goodlettsville LLC

February 23, 2021 | by Friedman & Houlding LLP

A Tennessee woman has filed a Complaint in Davidson County Chancery Court alleging that her employer, Motel 6, did nothing to protect her from harassment based on her HIV positive status–and that she was summarily fired for taking action after the hotel was sold to a franchisee. Friedman & Houlding LLP represents the Plaintiff, Jane Roe, who is proceeding under a pseudonym to protect her personal health information.

Roe worked at a corporate-owned Motel 6 location. When she began taking a medication that could cause dizziness, she informed the two on-site managers about her HIV status so they could take appropriate precautions to protect their own health in the event she fell and was injured on the job.

Roe alleged that one of the managers proceeded to engage in a campaign of harassment based on Roe’s HIV status, including telling numerous coworkers as well as hotel guests that Roe “has AIDS,” telling a pregnant co-worker not to use the employee restroom after Roe, leaving Clorox wipes in the bathroom as a reference to Roe being “unclean,” and mocking Roe by asking about her health, making comments like “you look swollen today, are you sure your health is okay?” Roe alleged that the conduct even escalated to harassing phone calls on the hotel line while Roe was at work.

Plaintiffs await decision on appeal of claims against CRST Expedited, Inc.

February 11, 2021 | by Friedman & Houlding LLP

A class of women working as truck drivers for CRST are waiting on a decision from the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals that could revive claims that CRST retaliated against them by placing them on the equivalent of unpaid leave for complaining about sexual harassment. The Complaint in Sellars, et al. v. CRST Expedited, Inc., No. 1:15-cv-117 (N.D. Iowa), was filed in October 2015. The women who brought this case were team truck drivers who were paired up with one co-driver to run long haul routes across the country. The drivers earned pay by the mile, switching off driving duties and sleeping in an onboard berth area so that the truck rarely needed to stop. The plaintiffs alleged that they were sexually harassed by male co-drivers and driving trainers, who they claimed subjected them to sexual come-ons, requests for sexual favors in exchange for good driver training feedback, offensive sexual touching–including waking up in the sleeper berth with a male co-driver on top of them, and even threats of violence if they would not comply with sexual demands. They alleged that even after CRST claimed it had banned any particular alleged harasser from driving with women, the women went on to be sexually harassed by subsequent male co-drivers. For some women, this was enough to push them out of the industry altogether.

Plaintiffs also alleged, on behalf of a class of women drivers, that when a woman on a truck complained she was being sexually harassed by her co-driver, CRST’s standard response was to remove her from the truck, with the effect of immediately stopping her pay, and letting the alleged harasser continue driving and earning money. Plaintiffs argued that this discouraged women from making complaints. The district court initially granted both a hostile work environment and a retaliation class, allowing the Plaintiffs named in the Complaint to represent other women with similar alleged experiences. However, following discovery, the district court granted CRST’s motion to de-certify the hostile work environment class, and to dismiss both the retaliation class and individual claims.

This was not the end: the three named plaintiffs decided to appeal the dismissal of the class retaliation claim and their individual hostile work environment claims to the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals (No. 19-2708, Sellars et al. v. CRST Expedited, Inc.). There, they argued that under very unusual circumstances such as these, where a woman may be harassed by multiple co-drivers sequentially, even if any particular alleged harasser might be banned from driving with women in the future, it can be sufficiently clear that harassment in the workplace is endemic that the employer is put on notice of the need to do more to address the problem. They also reiterated their argument that a pay cut inevitably deters women from complaining about sexual harassment, so taking women off their trucks as a response to their complaints is retaliatory. The Eighth Circuit heard oral argument on September 22, 2020, [available here: http://media-oa.ca8.uscourts.gov/OAaudio/2020/9/192708.MP3], and since then the women have been awaiting a decision. They hope to not only secure justice for themselves and other women at CRST, but to make clear once and for all that women should be free to come forward about sexual harassment in the workplace without fearing a pay cut.

Jury awards $910,000 against AutoZone for Sexual Harassment in case tried by Friedman & Houlding- emotional distress damages upheld on appeal

February 11, 2021 | by Friedman & Houlding LLP

This verdict of $910,000 is a reminder that employers are required to take prompt action when they become aware an employee is being sexually harassed. Autozone’s failure to take action when it knew of the sexual harassment resulted in the highest sexual harassment verdict in North and South Carolina in 2018. The jury awarded $100,000 for emotional distress damages for Defendant’s violation of Title VII based on sexual harassment. It awarded $600,000 in punitive damages for the Title VII violation. In addition, the jury determined that the company was liable for intentionally inflicting emotional distress on the Plaintiff, awarding $150,000 in damages for severe emotional distress, and an additional $60,000 in punitive damages. Because Title VII caps allowable damages, the verdict was initially reduced to a total of $510,000.

AutoZoners, LLC appealed the verdict, asking for a new trial, and alternatively asking the Court to throw out $150,000 in emotional distress damages, along with $260,000 in punitive damages. The Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit found there was no basis for a new trial, and that the jury’s award of damages for emotional distress under Title VII and “severe” emotional distress for Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress was not duplicative. Thus, the Court upheld Plaintiff’s emotional distress damages award totaling $250,000, for violating Title VII and for intentionally inflicting emotional distress, only vacating the punitive damages award, because of the standards for holding a company legally responsible for such damages.

Racism at University of Illinois-Chicago: UIC Fails to Protect Mechanic from Harassment after Noose Appears

October 28, 2014 | by Friedman & Houlding LLP

Employers are obligated to act promptly when they learn about ongoing workplace sexual or racial harassment. When employers ignore workplace harassment, the public will find out. Media coverage is an important tool for exposing and fighting workplace racism and sexism.

Media attention typically motivates employers to act quickly to remedy racial harassment to show the public that they take these issues seriously. An employer that acts promptly to correct the situation, in the face of this negative media attention, has an opportunity to foster a culture of tolerance, and potentially, to avoid liability for the harassment. However, when employers have knowledge of harassment and fail to act in the face of media coverage, their lack of concern for the victims of the harassment will be showcased for the public.
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Plaintiff is Entitled to Read the Defendant’s Email

July 20, 2013 | by Friedman & Houlding LLP

Friedman & Houlding LLP routinely seeks production of e-mail, texts and video that contain racially and sexually offensive words and images, sent by managers. These are the same managers charged with enforcing the employer’s discrimination and harassment policy. More often than not, we find these same managers are downloading offensive material, and emailing the material to others at the employer. Courts have held this evidence admissible on whether the employer had an effective anti-harassment policy, the bias of those charged with enforcing the alleged anti-discrimination policy, and whether managers were negligent in responding to complaints.
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