When a coworker grabs a colleague three times, a Seventh Circuit majority says a jury could find sexual harassment. The employer still won. The reason why is more useful to HR than the result.
According to the EEOC, an employee complained about six months of sexual harassment. Her employer allegedly did nothing. So she went to court, got a protective order against the harasser, handed a copy to HR, and was fired the next day. The harasser kept his job.
A police department ran a volunteer program that looked and felt a lot like a job, complete with uniforms, badges, ranks, performance reviews, and a paramilitary chain of command. Three young women in the program alleged sex discrimination and retaliation, got dismissed, waited over two years to file charges, and then sued under Title VII. The court shut it all down. Continue reading
Employers that rely on arbitration agreements should pay attention to a recent Sixth Circuit decision. One plausible sexual-harassment claim can keep an entire lawsuit in court—even claims that would otherwise go to arbitration. Continue reading
Some employers try. The Fourth Circuit just explained why that trick doesn’t work for these federal discrimination claims. Continue reading
Under basic contract law, yes. But thanks to the Ending Forced Arbitration Act, that may not be the end of the story. Continue reading
Sometimes courts resolve complex employment issues. And sometimes they are asked whether an employee suffered legal harm because she didn’t get to say goodbye to coworkers.
Buckle up. Continue reading
Employees and supervisors often assume that any inappropriate physical contact is automatically a hostile work environment. But the Eleventh Circuit continues to apply one of the strictest “severe or pervasive” standards in the country. This case shows just how high that bar is.
This is part two of the series. Yesterday’s post covered why a criminal subpoena did not count as Title VII “participation.” Today, we look at the employee’s hostile work environment claim. Continue reading
Sometimes the timing writes the headline for you. On October 31, a federal court in New Jersey decided a harassment case that involved an unforgettable Halloween costume and a reminder that bad taste is not always a legal violation. Continue reading
The Supreme Court recently made it easier for employees to prove discrimination, lowering the bar from “serious harm” to “some harm.” That change came from a 2024 sex discrimination case, but its reasoning can influence other Title VII claims too. A new decision from the federal court in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania shows that even when courts apply that softer standard to quid pro quo harassment claims, retaliation still requires a higher level of proof, and neither test was met here. Continue reading
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