Articles Posted in Sexual Harassment

You’ve heard the expression “loose lips sink ships.”

Well, the opposite holds true when an employee complains to a supervisor about workplace discrimination. Continue reading

Ten of your employees, including two supervisors, plan and attend an “unofficial” happy hour after work at a local bar. It’s unofficial because the company does not sponsor it, none of the employees are paid for their time, and no business is discussed.

Now, let’s assume that this hour is anything but happy for one of your employees. She’s getting skeeved out by a co-worker who is making all sorts of inappropriate comments to her, including questions about where she was going after the happy hour, and if she was going home to her husband. One of the supervisors notices the employee’s discomfort and helps her “escape” to her car to drive home.

Could ignoring this out-of-the-office behavior expose the company to a viable hostile work environment claim?

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Or, as the kids say, it’s scary AF! Continue reading

Over the weekend, I was reading this recent opinion from a federal judge in Maryland and, with a big smile on my face, I started polishing up my blogging crown and scepter.

Allen v. TV One, LLC is a case about a woman who alleges that she was constantly pestered by the Board Chair to marry the company CEO, the Board Chair’s son. For example, the Board Chair supposedly told the plaintiff,  “I’m going to be your mother one way or another. Either you will marry [my son] or I will marry your father and be your stepmother.”

And, I’m like…this opinion has The Employer Handbook written all over it!

Except, then I remembered. I already did blog about it. Continue reading

Is this prurient blog title a convenient excuse to play a J. Geils Band tune on the blog? Maybe. But, still I’ll toss in a side of HR-compliance. Continue reading

I’m not sure what kind of evidence a federal jury was expecting when it concluded that two plaintiff-intervenors (i.e., the alleged victims of sexual harassment on whose behalf the EEOC pursued claims) did not do enough to notify the employer-defendant about possible harassment in the workplace.

And neither did a federal judge when he concluded that a federal jury plainly overlooked evidence that the employer-defendant should have known about possible sexual harassment.

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As an employment lawyer nearly 20 years under my belt, I’m fairly jaded. Or maybe, I’m just numb.

Either way, I have plenty of stories for a cocktail hour. Continue reading