Learning Lessons From The Trenches: Wallace v. Valentino
December, 2002
In the last issue of the CM Report, we discussed the United States Supreme Court decision in Morgan v. National Railroad, where the court said that the continuous violation theory did not apply to claims of discreet acts of discrimination but did apply to claims of harassment. Lessons also can be learned down in the “trenches” where employers and employees battle it out in the district courts. Consider the following scenario:
Your company’s employment handbook contains warnings that employees must report harassment to a specific person and department. Therefore, your company has set up a specific complaint reporting procedure to be followed by an employee who alleges harassment. Your company feels comfortable that it is protected.
Not necessarily so, according to a recent district court decision, Wallace v. Valentino, 2002 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 19809 (D. Neb.), where Federal Judge Warren Urbom let an employee’s harassment claim stand despite handbook warnings that employees were to report alleged harassment to a specific person (which the employee ignored).
Facts
Ms. Wallace filed suit in federal court alleging that the defendant company created a hostile work environment. The company had a handbook which required that each employee report harassment to a specific person in the corporate office or alternatively to the employee’s manager. Ms. Wallace never reported the alleged harassment to the persons identified in the handbook. Instead, as Ms. Wallace admitted in her deposition, she only reported the harassment to her supervisors, not to her department manager.
The employer moved for summary judgment based on the admission from Ms. Wallace’s deposition testimony. In response, Ms. Wallace argued that she had reported the harassment to her supervisors because the company had an unwritten policy that allowed employees to report to the supervisors and her supervisors promised they would take care of the matter.
Analysis
Judge Urbom noted that the company’s manual did indeed advise Ms. Wallace that she had to report harassment to a specifically designated person or her manager. The court observed, however, that co-workers allegedly harassed Ms. Wallace, not supervisors or managers. Therefore, Judge Urbom held that the company’s attempt to build a defense based on Wallace’s failure to properly report harassment simply did not apply -- when, as here, the harasser was a co-worker, and not a supervisor or manager.
Learning Points:
The following lessons can be gleaned from the Wallace decision:
• Do not permit informal reporting practices which vary from the company’s written policy
• Tell supervisors that they will be disciplined if they do not report harassment complaints of employees who do not report the incidents through the proper chain command
• State in the company handbook that reporting to a supervisor is proper procedure except where the supervisor is the harasser
• Remind every employee that it is his or her responsibility to report harassment; employees should not assume that anyone else is reporting the harassment
Back to CM Report of Recent Decisions (2002v4) 2002 Volume 4 Table of Contents
