Last year, several media outlets reported about a lawsuit that a clothing designer who worked for Lizzo and her touring company had asserted against them and another individual. That lawsuit included several claims under state law for discrimination, retaliation, and assault, among others. On paper, it didn’t sound good for…
Is this post safe for work? Yes, it is. Did I write it in Incognito mode, just in case? Yes, I did. A recent California decision offers employers a good reminder about the importance of applying work rules and policies evenly to avoid potential discrimination claims. The case involves a…
Employers don’t have crystal balls. Last week, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals reaffirmed the well-settled rule that when one coworker accuses another of creating a hostile work environment, that claim will fail ten times out of ten unless the employer knew or should have known about the harassment but…
Yesterday, the EEOC announced that it had sued an employer for allegedly denying a new hire request to leave training early for an urgent medical evaluation related to her pregnancy and rescinded her job offer. These are just allegations. However, according to the EEOC complaint, the federal discrimination watchdog appears to…
Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits employers from discriminating against employees and applicants based on sex. In 2020, the Supreme Court interpreted Title VII’s ban on sex discrimination to include employer bias based on sexual orientation. But, did you know that in about half the country,…
In 2015, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission determined that a federal agency that denied an employee equal access to a common bathroom/facility corresponding to the employee’s gender identity discriminated based on sex and could not restrict a transgender employee to a single-user restroom. About five years later, the Supreme…
In the past week, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has brought two lawsuits against employers that allegedly violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act by discriminating against transgender employees. In one of the lawsuits, the EEOC claims that a transgender employee complained that she believed a manager had…
Let’s start with what you probably know already — especially if you are an employment lawyer. To prevail on a hostile work environment claim, a plaintiff must show that she was harassed based on some protected class. In plain English, enduring hostile behavior isn’t enough. A woman alleging a hostile…
A staffing company allegedly fulfilling a customer’s discriminatory hiring practices learned this lesson the hard way. Two years ago, the EEOC announced that it had sued a staffing company that allegedly honored requests that some business clients made over several years to fill positions with only male workers. The EEOC…
Yesterday, we addressed the risks of not letting HR do its job by investigating sexual harassment complaints. Today, we’ll discuss a recent decision underscoring the importance of thoroughly investigating employee complaints. Ironically, the subject of the investigation was an HR supervisor. One of her subordinates complained to the HR Supervisor’s…