Plaintiff alleged she was inappropriately sexually touched by her Plant Manager and that the Manager also made inappropriate sexual comments over a number of years.
The Manager denied the comments and conduct.
Winer, Burritt & Scott, LLP, through extensive discovery and investigation in multiple states, was able to establish that prior to Plaintiff a number of other female employees had complained about the Plant Manager, yet, nothing was done to stop his conduct. In addition, Plaintiff herself complained on numerous occasions, yet, the Company took insufficient steps to stop the perpetrator from sexually harassing Plaintiff.
Further, the law firm was able to establish that the Company gave too much autonomy to local Plant Managers, allowing the Plant Managers to supervise the local Human Resource Managers thus, preventing the Human Resource Department from taking effective action since HR personnel were intimidated by the plant manager they had to report to.
Winer, Burritt & Scott, LLP, through extensive discovery, created a significant threat to defendant that the Plant Manager perpetrator would be found to be as managing agent of the Company, thus exposing the Corporation to a large punitive damage risk, even though the sexual harassment itself was relatively mild.
RESULT: $1,950,000 settlement on behalf of Plaintiff