The U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Monday that employers can be held liable for damages in sexual harassment cases when a hostile work environment forces a worker to quit.
Voting 8-1, the justices set the standard for such cases and ruled plaintiffs alleging sexual harassment must show the abusive working environment became so intolerable the resignation qualified as a fitting response.
The decision clarified the scope of a 1998 high court ruling that established broad guidelines for employer liability when a supervisor engaged in sexual harassment.
The 1998 ruling said employers could be held liable, even if top managers did not know about the harassment, when it resulted in "tangible employment action" against the worker like firing or demotion.
The justices ruled the standard employer defenses under the 1998 decision may not be asserted if the plaintiff quit in a "reasonable response" to an adverse action officially changing the person's employment status or situation.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg listed some examples of the changes, such as a humiliating demotion, an extreme cut in pay or a transfer to a position in which the employee would face unbearable working conditions.
The case involved Nancy Drew Suders, who began work in March 1998 as a communications operator for the Pennsylvania State Police. She claimed she had been subjected to sexual harassment that forced her to quit five months later.
She claimed the harassment by three male supervisors included sexually charged posturing, leering and remarks and repeated attempts to engage her in discussion of bestiality, oral sex and genital piercing.
Suders sued and sought to hold the Pennsylvania State Police liable for the actions of the three officers.
A federal judge dismissed the lawsuit on the grounds the state police had in place an anti-harassment policy and that Suders failed to bring a complaint under those procedures.
But a U.S. appeals court reinstated the lawsuit and ruled Suders should be allowed to pursue her claims.
A coalition of civil rights groups supported Suders while business groups and the U.S. Justice Department backed the Pennsylvania State Police in arguing the appeals court ruling should be overturned.
Although allowing the case to go forward, Ginsburg said the appeals court had erred in ruling employers never could use the standard defenses when employees have been forced to quit. The defenses outlined in the 1998 ruling involve having a procedure for sexual harassment complaints and an employee unreasonably failing to use it.
Ginsburg sent the case back for more hearings on Suders' claims of hostile work environment that forced her to quit.
Justice Clarence Thomas dissented. He said Suders had not produced sufficient evidence of an adverse employment action because of her sex and has not offered any evidence her employer knew or should have known of the alleged harassment.