Sexual Harassment

Many workplace discrimination cases involve the situation where a supervisor harasses or discriminates against an employee. However, what happens where the harasser is a co-worker? A recent employment discrimination case – Velazquez-Perez v. Developers Diversified Realty Corp. – evaluated whether a man was wrongfully terminated based on his rejection of the human resources manager’s sexual advances. In Velazquez-Perez, a shopping…

Sexual harassment is one of the most frequent discrimination claims. However, what actions may be considered harassing behavior vary. The courts are constantly struggling to define what sexual harassment is and what it is not, and sometimes the results can be quite confusing–the devil is in the details. What is clear, though, is that, whether…

Unfortunately, racism is still alive and well in our society. The news regularly reports stories of nooses on factory floors and crude racist jokes being circulated through company email systems. Fortunately, Title VII prohibits employers from discriminating against their employees “because of” their race or color. That means that employers may not take your race…

A recent case out of Alabama reviewed the situation where a co-worker’s “creepy” actions created such a difficult situation that a jury could consider it a “hostile work environment.” In Hollis v. Town of Mount Vernon, a female dispatcher complained that another part-time dispatcher – William Cannon – wouldn’t leave her alone and made her feel…

Sexual harassment is one of the most well-known forms of employment discrimination. But what happens if you’re a victim of sexual harassment at work? Do you know who to tell? When does your employer need to act? A recent employment discrimination case involving allegations of same-sex harassment looked at what is “sufficient notice” of a…

A Connecticut court has just determined that a female police officer can advance her claims of sex discrimination and sex harassment. One of her primary complaints – the police chief repeatedly referred to her as that “chick cop.” Despite some progress toward equality in the work place, sex discrimination and sexual harassment still continue. Fortunately,…

What some workers may consider “goofing around” or “horse play” can have serious consequences. In a recent case out of Mississippi, a nursing home supervisor pulled down the pants and underwear of a nurse in front of several co-workers. The nurse later resigned from the job, stating that the offensive conduct made her job intolerable.…

Unfortunately despite efforts to eradicate sexism and it’s existence in the workplace, many workers still report instances of harassment, name-calling and negative treatment based on their gender. Either men or women can be victims of sex harassment or sex discrimination. Whenever you are subjected to bias based on your gender you may have a claim…

A recent case out of California determined that even though certain allegations were not raised during the administrative phase of a sexual harassment case, that those allegations could be raised as part of the civil sexual harassment lawsuit. Sexual harassment is probably the most well known form of employment discrimination. What is not as well…