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Sex Harassment Case Will Set State Law on Employers' Liability
By: Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer
Friday, February 15, 2002
San Francisco Chronicle
Article as it appears at SFGate.com
The state Supreme Court is taking up a major issue in sexual harassment
cases, agreeing to decide whether employers are financially responsible
for supervisors' harassment of workers.
Five of the seven justices voted Wednesday to review an appellate ruling in November that said California law makes employers liable for the supervisors' conduct even if they are unaware of it.
The U.S. Supreme Court set a different standard under federal civil rights law in 1998. That ruling let employers off the hook if they had taken all reasonable steps to prevent harassment and to stop it once it happened, and if the employee had failed to take advantage of those procedures.
The November ruling by the state Court of Appeal in Sacramento said California law was more favorable to employees, giving employers "the obligation to provide a harassment-free workplace" and making them responsible for the acts of their supervisors.
But last April, the U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco, which oversees federal courts in the state, ruled that California law was similar to federal law, allowing employers to use their anti-harassment policies as a defense.
The conflict between the state and federal court rulings will now be resolved by the state Supreme Court, the final authority on the meaning of California law.
The ruling will determine whether liability is confined to the harassing supervisor in certain cases, making it harder for the victim to collect a large damage award.
The case under review involves a state Department of Health Services employee, Theresa McGinnis, who said she was sexually harassed by her supervisor from mid-1995 onward. When she reported it to management in November 1997, the department started disciplinary proceedings, and the supervisor retired.
McGinnis sued both her former supervisor and the department. The department wants to be dismissed from the suit, arguing that it had a strong anti- harassment policy that could have resolved the problem if McGinnis had taken advantage of it sooner.
In papers filed with the state's high court, lawyers for the state argued that allowing employers to use their anti-harassment policies as a defense would encourage employers to establish such policies and employees to use them, state lawyers wrote.
McGinnis' attorneys countered that automatic liability for supervisors' misconduct gave employers a strong incentive to prevent harassment.
last updated: February 15, 2002
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