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Article: Supreme Court ruling on harrassment places premium on employer sexual harassment policies
- Article from:
- The Enterprise
- Article date:
- July 19, 2004
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright Enterprise Business Newspaper Inc. Jul 19, 2004. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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Employers have long had a legal incentive to put policies and procedures in place for the reporting of sexual harassment by employees, and for the investigation and remediation of sexually harassing conduct by the employer. A recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling has increased that incentive.
In June, the U.S. Supreme Court held that an employer is not strictly (or automatically) liable for sexual harassment by supervisory-level employees when the harassed employee resigns, at least when the resignation is not precipitated by the employer's "official act." Where there is no such "official act," an employer may assert the affirmative defense that it had effective procedures for employee reporting ...