A Texas critical care transportation company has agreed to pay $90,000 in damages and furnish other relief in order to settle a lawsuit filed by the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).
According to the EEOC’s lawsuit, two female employees were subjected to repeated sexual harassment by persons in executive management and supervisory positions for the company. The allegations included not only verbal sexual harassment but also physical acts such as unwanted sexual touching and forced submission to sex as a condition of employment. According to the EEOC, working conditions became so intolerable that one of the female employees felt she had no other option but to resign. Another female employee was fired shortly after she rejected sexual advances from a supervisor and complained about the sexual harassment, the EEOC charged.
Such alleged conduct violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits sexual harassment in the workplace as well as retaliation against an employee for reporting and/or opposing harassment. The EEOC filed its lawsuit after first attempting to reach a pre-litigation settlement through its conciliation process.
The five-year consent decree settling the suit prohibits future sex-based discrimination and the creation or facilitation of a work environment hostile to any employees on the basis of sex. In addition to the monetary relief, the decree requires the company to take steps to prevent and eliminate sexual harassment in its workplace, such as adopting a written policy against employment discrimination, hiring an independent outside monitor to investigate all complaints of sexual harassment and retaliation in the workplace, and annual training on Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for all employees.
Issue:
Sexual harassment is a form of sex discrimination that violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature constitutes sexual harassment when submission to or rejection of this conduct explicitly or implicitly affects an individual’s employment, unreasonably interferes with an individual’s work performance, or creates an intimidating, hostile, or offensive work environment. A complaint of harassment must be investigated promptly and impartially. Equal employment opportunity laws prohibit punishing job applicants or employees for asserting their rights to be free from employment discrimination including harassment. Participating in a complaint process is protected from retaliation under all circumstances.
Discussion Points:
- Review your policies and procedures on preventing harassment, including sexual harassment. Also review policies and procedures on nonretaliation. Update your policies as needed.
- Train staff on what is considered harassment and their role in promptly reporting all types of harassment to a supervisor or the compliance and ethics officer. Train supervisors and the compliance and ethics officer on their role when harassment has been reported to them by an employee. Stress the importance of nonretaliation. Document that these trainings occurred and file the signed documents in each employee’s education file.
- Periodically audit by anonymously polling staff to determine if they are being sexually harassed or experiencing discrimination and ask if they feel free to report such instances without fear of retaliation or retribution.
