Glasgow v. Georgia-Pacific Corp.
| Decision Date | 10 January 1985 |
| Docket Number | No. 50279-0,GEORGIA-PACIFIC,50279-0 |
| Citation | 693 P.2d 708,103 Wn.2d 401 |
| Parties | , 51 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. (BNA) 880, 38 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 35,627 Michelle M. GLASGOW, an individual, Ruth E. Holder, an individual, and Evelyn S. Milne, an individual, Respondents, v.CORPORATION, a foreign corporation; David Long, individually and as agent of Georgia-Pacific Corporation, a foreign corporation, and David Long and "Jane Doe" Long, husband and wife; George Simpkin, individually and as an agent of Georgia-Pacific Corporation, a foreign corporation; George Simpkin and "Jane Doe" Simpkin, husband and wife; Richard Everett, individually and as an agent of Georgia-Pacific Corporation, a foreign corporation, and Richard Everett and "Jane Doe" Everett, husband and wife, Appellants. |
| Court | Washington Supreme Court |
Lane, Powell, Moss & Miller, Eugene R. Nielson, Seattle, for appellants.
Manza, Moceri, Gustafson & Messina, P.S., Michael S. Manza, John S. Glassman, Tacoma, for respondents.
This case of first impression in this state involves sexual harassment at the work place.
Two female employees brought suit against their employer, Georgia-Pacific Corporation, alleging sex discrimination in violation of RCW 49.60 and the tort of outrage. The complaint of a third female employee was severed from this suit and continued until a later date. Following a trial to the court, extensive findings of fact were entered. The findings are unchallenged on appeal, therefore, we consider them as verities for purposes of the appeal.
Some factual details, as found by the trial court in this case, must be recounted in order to delineate the egregious pattern of conduct the two female workers were subjected to on the job.
From October 1979 until January 1982, David Long, a male co-worker, on several occasions "would place his hands on [one of the plaintiff's] hips and rub his crotch across her back side as he was passing". One night at work this co-worker approached her, staring at her breasts. He then placed his hand on her right breast without any welcome or invitation. He "molested" this plaintiff another time "by approaching her from behind and grabbing her buttocks with his hands".
As early as November 1979 the plant manager knew this male employee was "using abusive language around female employees" and had "touched or fondled" this plaintiff and another female employee "in an unwanted sexual way". No corrective or disciplinary action was taken. Complaints of the co-worker's "other intimidating behavior" toward this plaintiff were lodged again in mid-1981, this time to a plant superintendent who acknowledged that other female employees, including the other plaintiff in this action, were also having problems with this male co-worker. Shortly thereafter, this plaintiff began to hear threats and complaints concerning her job performance purportedly coming from the plant manager.
The other plaintiff had been working for the employer for only a month when the same male co-worker began to press himself against her in the same manner as he passed by her. A complaint was lodged with the plant superintendent. The male co-worker would also stare at her "in a sexually intimidating way, follow her about the plant, in such a way that it intimidated her, [and] interfered with her work performance". She tried to avoid him and informed the plant manager "who did nothing". She and yet another female employee confronted the plant manager about this "continued sexual harassment".
The male co-worker was finally transferred to another shift, but his course of intimidation continued. In addition, other employees, including a supervisor, acted "in an intimidating fashion" toward this plaintiff because of her complaints.
Not until February 1982 was the male co-worker given a 3-day suspension "based on his prior acts of sexual harassment".
One of the plaintiffs suffered "severe emotional anguish and distress demonstrated by physical symptoms" of various kinds. She resigned in December 1981 after working less than 9 months. The other plaintiff was "emotionally and psychologically injured" and likewise demonstrated physical manifestations of "severe emotional distress". She resigned in October 1982.
The trial court found that as a result of the foregoing acts and inactions, along with other similar ones, a hostile and intimidating work environment was created and it was this which proximately caused severe emotional distress to the plaintiffs. The trial court also found that these facts constituted the tort of outrage but that they did not permit a finding that either of the plaintiffs were constructively discharged from their jobs. Judgment for damages was entered for the employees against the employer in the aggregate sum of $46,875 plus costs and attorneys' fees in the amount of $17,275.
The employer appeals and the plaintiff-employees cross appeal. One principal issue is presented.
Did the trial court err in concluding that the employer was liable for sexual discrimination in violation of RCW 49.60?
CONCLUSION. The plaintiff-employees established that they were subjected to uninvited sexual harassment by a co-worker with the actual knowledge of two supervisory personnel who undertook no reasonably prompt and adequate remedial measures to alleviate the resulting hostile and intimidating work environment in which the employees found themselves. The recovery of damages by the plaintiff-employees for the mental and emotional suffering they sustained was an appropriate remedy for such unlawful sexual discrimination.
In the interest of readability, the citations in this opinion have been placed in the margin wherever feasible.
The Legislature has declared practices of discrimination because of sex to be matters of state concern. RCW 49.60.010. In furtherance of this concern, a state statute provides that "[i]t is an unfair practice for any employer ... [t]o discriminate against any person in compensation or in other terms or conditions of employment because of such person's ... sex", RCW 49.60.180(3), and another requires that such provision "be liberally construed for the accomplishment of the purposes thereof," RCW 49.60.020. Yet another statute provides that persons injured by such violations shall have a civil action to recover actual damages, costs and attorneys' fees. RCW 49.60.030(2).
In the case before us, the allegations of the plaintiff-employees were to the effect that certain acts and conduct of other employees of the employer constituted sexual harassment; that this harassment, which was known to exist by various of the employer's supervisory personnel, created a hostile and intimidating work environment thereby depriving them of the opportunity to work free of sexual discrimination; and that this discrimination caused them severe physical, mental and emotional distress. Thus the plaintiffs' claim essentially is that their employer implicitly, but effectively, made their endurance of sexual intimidation a term or condition of their employment.
These allegations are actionable under this state's Law Against Discrimination, RCW 49.60. Sexual harassment as a working condition unfairly handicaps an employee against whom it is directed in his or her work performance and as such is a barrier to sexual equality in the workplace. In assessing the viability of a sexual harassment claim under federal law, one court posited this rhetorical question: "How then can sexual harassment, which injects the most demeaning sexual stereotypes into the general work environment and which always represents an intentional assault on an individual's innermost privacy, not be illegal?" 1
Under the facts as found by the trial court, this is not a quid pro quo sexual harassment case, that is, it is not a situation where an employer requires sexual consideration from an employee as a quid pro quo for job benefits. It is, rather, a case wherein the employee seeks to hold the employer responsible for a hostile work environment created by a supervisor or co-worker's sexual harassment of the employee. As the Supreme Court of Minnesota held in construing an anti-sex discrimination statute similar to ours:
In our view, the Act does not impose a duty on the employer to maintain a pristine working environment. Rather, it imposes a duty on the employer to take prompt and appropriate action when it knows or should know of co-employees' conduct in the workplace amounting to sexual harassment.
Continental Can Co. v. Minnesota, 297 N.W.2d 241, 249 (Minn.1980).
To establish a work environment sexual harassment case, the better reasoned rule is that an employee must prove the existence of the following elements. 2
(1) The harassment was unwelcome. In order to constitute harassment, the complained of conduct must be unwelcome in the sense that the plaintiff-employee did not solicit or incite it, and in the further sense that the employee regarded the conduct as undesirable or offensive.
(2) The harassment was because of sex. The question to be answered here is: would the employee have been singled out and...
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...opinion. MADSEN, Justice (dissenting). Without acknowledging the fact, the majority opinion overrules Glasgow v. Georgia-Pacific Corp., 103 Wash.2d 401, 693 P.2d 708 (1985), this court's unanimous precedent establishing the causal standard for gender discrimination under RCW 49.60.180. More......
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