A feminine worker at an Alabama navy base was granted practically $154,000 in damages for sexual harassment, bodily assault and retaliation she suffered by the hands of civilians and officers.
Rebecca O’Brien, a lead plans specialist at Fort Rucker, was topic to undesirable sexual textual content messages from her civilian supervisor, who yanked her hair again whereas they had been on a stairwell earlier than calling her a “b—-,” in response to her grievance filed with the U.S. Equal Employment Alternative Fee.
The incidents happened in 2018 and 2019.
O’Brien additionally claimed her civilian supervisor, Sean Sparks, handed her a screw and mentioned “this can make you are feeling higher. I may help you with this,” and inappropriately touched her calf throughout a gathering.
The harassment was not simply restricted to civilians, in response to O’Brien’s grievance filed by her legal professional, Kevin Owen of Gilbert Employment Regulation.
A significant on the Alabama base stared at her chest whereas he referred to as her into his workplace and requested her to face up and switch round for him, in response to the grievance.
O’Brien confronted retaliation after she made formal complaints in regards to the habits, together with being declared AWOL the day after she made the primary grievance.
She was additionally declared AWOL after reporting the sexual textual content messages in September 2018, regardless that she had a physician’s word excusing her absences.
In January 2019, Maj. Carl Warren, the main that stared at her chest, reprimanded O’Brien for tardiness on the identical day he was testifying within the case.
In 2015, O’Brien, then Fort Rucker’s drug and alcohol prevention coordinator, spoke at a workshop for the bottom’s troopers on how alcohol and drug abuse can gasoline sexual abuse, in response to an Army story on the occasion.
Final week, an administrative decide overseeing the case awarded O’Brien $153,723 in damages and about $247,000 in attorneys charges.
EEOC Administrative Decide Ross Parker’s ruling additionally ordered the Army to supply eight hours of “reprisal, sex-based discrimination, and sexual harassment” coaching for supervisors and managers at Fort Rucker and to “contemplate” disciplinary fees towards Sean Sparks, O’Brien’s civilian supervisor.
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