Article: If an employer is unaware, is it sexual harassment? Supreme Court to consider lifeguard's, student's cases

At 19, Beth Faragher got her dream job. She would work her way through college as an ocean lifeguard for a city on Florida's gold coast. Sun, sand, surf and $7 an hour.

Instead of bliss on a beach, she recalled, "the harassment started almost immediately."

Over the next five years, from 1985 to 1990, Bill Terry and another male supervisor often made vulgar and humiliating sexual remarks to her and other female lifeguards, and patted, slapped or squeezed various parts of their bodies. Faragher said she was afraid to complain to her employer, the City of Boca Raton, Fla., and was unaware of any city policy against sexual harassment. Eventually, Faragher quit to attend law school. She also ...

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