You pay nothing unless we recover for you.*
*Applies to employment and personal injury matters. Employment-based immigration visa matters are not handled on a contingency fee basis.
Workplace Harassment
We represent employees in harassment, discrimination, retaliation, whistleblower, and wrongful termination matters.
Most people who call us about harassment open the same way: "I don't know if this is bad enough to be illegal."
That instinct is worth taking seriously, because it is usually wrong in one specific direction. California law is broader than most employees think, and in 2019 the Legislature went out of its way to say so.
HARASSMENT IS NOT JUST ABOUT SEX
This is the first thing people get wrong.
California law makes it unlawful for an employer, or any other person, because of race, religious creed, color, national origin, ancestry, physical disability, mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, sex, sexual orientation, or age, to harass an employee, an applicant, an unpaid intern or volunteer, or a person providing services pursuant to a contract.
California law proscribes harassment of all the specified protected classes to the same extent as harassment based on sex.
Note who is covered. Not just employees. Applicants, unpaid interns, volunteers, and people providing services under a contract are all protected.
THE TWO SHAPES HARASSMENT TAKES
Quid pro quo.
A job benefit is conditioned on submitting to unwanted conduct, or a job detriment follows from refusing.
Hostile work environment.
The conduct is severe or pervasive enough that it alters the conditions of your employment.
The second one is where most cases live, and where most of the confusion is.
WHAT THE LEGISLATURE SAID IN 2019
Effective January 1, 2019, the Legislature passed a law declaring how harassment cases should be handled. It did something unusual: it named specific court decisions and either approved or disapproved them.
Four points are worth knowing before you decide your situation isn't bad enough.
One incident can be enough.
The Legislature declared that a single incident of harassing conduct is sufficient to create a triable issue regarding the existence of a hostile work environment, if the harassing conduct has unreasonably interfered with your work performance or created an intimidating, hostile, or offensive working environment.
If you have been told that one incident is never enough, that is not what the law says.
You do not have to prove your work suffered.
The Legislature affirmed that a plaintiff need not prove that his or her tangible productivity declined as a result of the harassment. It is enough to prove that a reasonable person subjected to the conduct would find, as you did, that the harassment so altered working conditions as to make it more difficult to do the job.
Employers frequently argue the opposite: that your reviews stayed fine, so nothing happened. The law addresses that argument directly.
Stray remarks are not automatically thrown out.
The Legislature affirmed the rejection of the stray remarks doctrine, and confirmed that the existence of a hostile work environment depends on the totality of the circumstances. A discriminatory remark, even if it was not made in the context of an employment decision, and even if the person who said it was not a decisionmaker, may be relevant circumstantial evidence.
The comment from someone who isn't even your boss is not necessarily irrelevant.
The standard does not get lowered because of where you work.
The Legislature disapproved any reasoning that approves a harassment standard varying by type of workplace. Courts should consider the nature of the workplace only when engaging in or witnessing prurient conduct and commentary is integral to the performance of the job duties.
"That's just how it is in this industry" is not a defense in most workplaces.
And these cases resist being thrown out on paper.
The Legislature affirmed the observation that hostile working environment cases involve issues not determinable on paper.
THE PERSON WHO HARASSED YOU CAN BE PERSONALLY LIABLE
This surprises people, and it changes the calculation.
An employee of a covered entity is personally liable for harassment that he or she perpetrates, regardless of whether the employer knew or should have known of the conduct and failed to take immediate and appropriate corrective action.
So the individual can be a defendant, not just the company, and the employer's ignorance is not a shield for the harasser.
One limit worth stating plainly: a nonsupervisory coworker may not be personally liable for harassment. Whether the individual is a proper defendant depends on their role.
Separately, as of January 1, 2019, an employee alleged to have engaged in prohibited harassment may be held personally liable for retaliation.
WHAT TO DO NOW, IN ORDER
1. Write down what happened, with dates. Do it while it is fresh. What was said, who said it, who else was there.
2. Keep anything in writing. Emails, texts, Slack messages, voicemails. Forward them somewhere you will still have access to if you lose your work account tomorrow.
3. Do not quit before you have talked to someone. How you leave affects what claims you have.
4. Call.
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU CALL
1. A conversation, free, confidential, and no obligation. You tell us what happened. We ask questions.
2. We tell you honestly whether you have a case, including when you don't. We would rather say so on the first call than take a case that isn't there.
3. If we take it, we handle the filings and the deadlines. You go back to your life.
We don't get paid unless we recover for you. We advance all case costs and are reimbursed from the recovery. If there's no recovery, you owe nothing.
Call (818) 578-4969 for a free, confidential consultation.