Legal Question in Sexual Harassment in California
harasment in the work place
I work at a trucking company. there are 2 other people in the office, a dispatcher and a customer service rep. A couple of weeks ago, the customer service rep was absent, I was standing by her desk getting paper work, and the dispatcher walked past me and smacked me on my butt. I told him that he was wrong and he can't do that to me. The next week we got into in arguement over something dumb; he then stood up and was swearing at me. He just kept on until I started to cry. After i came out of the restroom, he started on me again and said why don't i just leave. so i went next door to the main office. where the owner of the compay is. I was asked to just wait a week until the owner returns from vacation and he will handle it. Within that week, we had a meeting with the owners secretary and i told her everything the dispathcher did to me, and of course he denied it. Once the owner got back, he called my whole office in for a meeting and said he's not going to talk to us individualy about the situation. He looked at the dispather and said he is not in trouble and told us to act like adults and get over it. we were then told to go back and run the office. He also said he wasn't sure as to how he should handle this.
Do i have a case?
1 Answer from Attorneys
Re: harasment in the work place
If you suffer ongoing sexual harassment and discrimination, and the company doesn't remedy it upon your complaint, or you suffer retaliation when you complain, then you have a claim. The only sexual incident you described was the butt slap, and a one time incident does not generally give grounds for a lawsuit. If it recurred, that would be different.
The yelling and general harassment is NOT illegal unless you can show it was a form of sexual harassment. Poor management and poor personal skills are not illegal. If they were, most people would be in jail.
You should start with a written complaint of sexual harassment and hostile environment, alleging the butt slap and other pertinent facts, as well as the failure to properly remedy and discipline. You can file a complaint with the Department of Fair Employment and Housing or with the EEOC. IF you want legal help, feel free to contact me.
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