Employment Outtakes

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Even in the chaotic world of Ohio workers’ compensation, crime still doesn’t pay – at least not for one enterprising Ohio claimant. Finding that the sale of crack cocaine over a three-year timeframe amounted to an exchange of labor for pay over a sustained period, the Ohio Supreme Court upheld the Industrial Commission’s determination that an…

As the Writers Guild of America’s strike against the Association of Motion Picture and Television Producers moves into its seventh week, cracks are beginning to appear in the union’s armor. Until this week, late night television staples such as Leno, O’Brien, Letterman, Stewart and Colbert were mired in “classic” episodes (read: reruns) without any end in sight. Now…

The importance of leaving your personal life at home-particularly if it involves a penchant for pornography-is amply highlighted by the Second Circuit’s decision in Patane v. Clark, No. 06-3446 (2nd Cir. Nov. 28, 2007). In Patane, the court upheld a female college secretary’s right to pursue a hostile work environment claim under Title VII and state discrimination laws based on her male supervisor’s pornographic video and website viewing habits. The supervisor allegedly viewed sexually-explicit videotapes for one to two hours every day on his office television, which was visible to his secretary through a glass partition. He also left pornographic videos scattered across his office floor, viewed pornographic websites on his secretary’s work computer, and required her, as a part of her secretarial duties, to open his mail, which included pornographic videotapes that the supervisor had delivered to his office.
Continue Reading Secretary May Pursue Sexual Harassment Suit for Hostile Work Environment Based on Boss’s Video Habit