Gender Identity Category Archives — Sexual Harassment Lawyer Blawg Published by New York Sexual Harassment Attorneys

Buffalo Wild Wings General Manager to Employees: Expect Sexual Harassment, According to EEOC Charge Alleging Complaints by Multiple Employees

April 11, 2025 | by Employment Law Firm

The following is taken from documents filed with the EEOC against Buffalo Wild Wings in Illinois. “Bill” (name changed to protect the victim), was subjected to frequent, sexually offensive comments by the General Manager of a Buffalo Wild Wings franchise in Marion, Illinois, where he worked. The GM aggressively taunted him, commenting about Bill’s sexual preferences, asking for his phone number so Bill could experience being with another man, and making statements about what “type of gay” the GM thought Bill was. Sometimes the GM would stand directly behind Bill at close proximity, causing Bill to feel physically unsafe and triggered. At the time Bill began his employment at Buffalo Wild Wings, he was a sexual assault survivor who was recovering from post-traumatic stress disorder. However, the constant sexualized taunting by the GM sent Bill into an emotional tailspin. The documents filed with the EEOC suggest that Buffalo Wild Wings could have and should have prevented this.

Bill was told by multiple coworkers that the GM had already been transferred from two other Buffalo Wild Wings locations due to complaints of sexual harassment. Soon after the GM was transferred to Marion, a Line Cook reported another cook for sexual harassment. The GM took the Line Cook into the office and told her that because it was a restaurant, sexual harassment was to be expected. That sent a clear message that sexual harassment was to be tolerated.

Around the time of the Line Cook’s complaint, another coworker sent the Director of Operations, Jon Bruenig, this email:

SCA Pharmaceuticals called out for anti-gay harassment by new witness in Federal Suit

March 20, 2025 | by Employment Law Firm

A witness has come forward and sworn under oath that a former employee of SCA Pharmaceuticals was sexually harassed and openly mocked by coworkers because he was a gay man. The following is taken from the Complaint against SCA filed in Federal Court and the Witness’s sworn statement. The names are redacted.

It was a recurring “joke” for The Harasser and his friends to ask The Employee how his girlfriend was doing, and who he would “chagachaga,” while thrusting their hips, to indicate they were referring to sex. The Harasser would rub his genitals, approach The Employee tell him to look down, gesture to his penis, chuckle and walk away. Since the harassment took place in front of a supervisor, The Employee believed that SCA was aware of it. Nonetheless it continued. In his sworn statement, The Witness describes seeing the Acting-Supervisor laughing along with offensive comments:

I witnessed our Team Lead . . . laugh along at these comments. . . .

Marty Cook of Patriot Contractors Posted Offensive Racial Material on his Facebook page

January 13, 2025 | by Employment Law Firm

Martin “Marty” Cook, is and was the Managing Member of Patriot Contractors, during the time two of its employees allege in their EEOC Charges (the following allegations are taken from their Charges), that they were subjected to racial harassment, anti-gay harassment, and retaliation.

Cook should lead by example. Yet even after the two employees filed EEOC Charges describing the racist abuse, Marty Cook, of Patriot Contractors, displayed a racially offensive video on his public Facebook page, as of the date of this blog. The video “jokes” about Black people all looking alike and Black people’s skin looking “ashy”, and presents African-Americans in a negative way.

Cook’s employees at Patriot Contracting may have access to his public Facebook page.

EEOC Charge: Veolia Nuclear Solutions Human Resources Explicitly Refuses to End Harassment Against Transgender Employee

March 18, 2024 | by Employment Law Firm

Employment Law Firm PC represents a transgender female (“Charging Party”), who has filed an EEOC Charge of harassment and retaliation against her former employer Veolia Nuclear Solutions (“Veolia”), a federally contracted company that carries out nuclear energy facility clean-up and waste removal, at its Richland, Washington location. As alleged in her EEOC Charge, Charging Party was forced to quit after filing a complaint of a hostile work environment with Veolia’s Human Resources department. Federal contractors are under a special duty to proactively abide by anti-discrimination laws. The OFCCP is responsible for enforcement.

As a technician at Veolia, Charging Party reported to a Project Manager (“Project Manager”) at the Richland project facility. The Project Manager directed gender-based harassment at Charging Party on an almost daily basis, likening transgender individuals to “freaks” and pedophiles, and when Charging Party later informed Project Manager of her impending gender transition, he intensified the harassment, taunting her with comments about “chopping off her pecker,” and telling her that her gender transitioning was a “mistake” she would regret.

In addition, Project Manager would regularly make bigoted comments, including comments about trans people, on speaker phone, in conversations he had with colleagues and project managers in other facilities, as well as to the then-Director of Technologies—knowing that others, including Charging Party could overhear. Charging Party felt persecuted for just being who she was, knowing that management condoned such vile harassment.