Courage: Doing the Right Thing, Even When It's Hard

This particular blog is intended for the legislators considering SB 188 and HB 205.  I imagine that people don't run for public office unless they have a desire to seek the public good.  It is inn the context of seeking the public good that I write this.

There is one very satisfying aspect of representing people in employment discrimination and whistle-blower cases, representing a person who has found his or her voice, a person who taps into the braver part of his or her personality.  Many people have beefs about something at work, but it is only a select few who we represent.  It is only a select few who have been wronged legally and have the fortitude to go forward. We represent people who have real cases for illegal discrimination and whistleblowing.  The ones we choose to represent have courage because it is hard to buck the status quo, to complain to or about ones boss, to rock the boat. I have always appreciated how courageous our clients are because going forward in a case like this is not easy. Discrimination and whistleblower claims are special because people who display the fortitude to go forward oftentimes go forward because they don't want what happened to them to happen to someone else.  Discrimination and whistleblower cases help society; they help each one of us. If it had not been for the courage of Rosa Parks, who knows where the Civil Rights movement would have gone.  If Dr. King had not taken up for Mrs. Parks, this might be a different society.  If someone had come forward to report Bernie Madoff, American society would have been better.

That leads me to SB 188, which limits the rights of people to go forward and bring cases of discrimination and whistleblowing.  The opposition claims, "We aren't eliminating these cases, we are just making them conform to federal standards."  However, that statement is not true.  Many courageous people will not be heard if this law were passed.  There are three parts of the bill which are troublesome - the elimination of individual liability, caps as low as $50,000, and passing a written whistleblower law that curtails the common law.

As an example of what this bill will do, I want to tell you about a couple of cases I have had.  I represented two women at a small not-for-profit business who reported that their boss was stealing from the company and downloading pornography to his computer.  This business had fewer than 6 employees and was run by a board of directors.  The boss was using the company credit card to purchase Christmas gifts for his family, buy electronics, etc.  One woman had been with the company for 26 years, the other for 18 years. Their terminations were emotionally devastating to both women, as they had put their hearts and souls into their work.  The first complainer was fired, the second was forced out.  The board of directors, all physicians, condoned the conduct and refused to take action except to authorize our clients terminations.  We had to sue the executive director individually.  The board of directors took no action against the executive director until after the second trial.  Finally, years later, he was fired.  By then, there was a judgment of $350,000 against the company and $200,000 against the executive director.  It was not until the second case settled in the middle of trial for $500,000 that the board took any action.  My old boss used to say, "People do the right thing if you make them."  The case got publicity, membership in the association which was the company faltered.  The company almost went under, but it did not.  When the membership learned of what the board had condoned, they were upset.  The problem was management and the board and what they had condoned.  Because of the lawsuits, the problems were fixed.  The executive director was fired, the board began to undertake their fiduciary duty and the company was saved.  If their had been a $50,000 cap on compensatory damages, which is what the new bills provides, this case probably would not have seen the light of day.  The litigation took years.  There is no provision for attorneys fees.  I fear our clients would have thrown in the towel.  The company was made better because of the lawsuit.

Likewise, I have represented women and girls in sexual harassment cases.  There are not near as many sexual harassment cases today because of the brave women who brought cases before and helped companies realize that sexual harassment training is essential.  Now, sexual harassment occurs in fast food restaurants with young girls.  They are young and naive.  They could be anyone's daughter.  Without the ability to name individual defendants, these companies fold and the owners open under a different entity's name.  Women are traumatized by sexual assaults and with this bill, women and girls will have little recourse.  The companies fold and open under a different name.  The only way to get accountability is to keep the individuals in as defendants.

I know our jury system is not perfect, but it is the best system in the world.  Missouri businesses are important, but not at the expense of our civil rights.  Plus, I know of not one company that has decided to locate in another state because of Missouri discrimination laws.  I am asking each of the Legislators, when deciding how to vote on these bills, to dig deep and vote your conscience.  It is hard to buck the system, especially when there is pressure to vote one way.  This issue is important. Please be proud of your vote.  

The Rise and Fall of a Mayor: An Illustration of the Importance of the MHRA

This is the story of how one woman brave enough to fight with Missouri discrimination laws on her side kept her boss a one term mayor.  Ruth Bates filed a lawsuit for harassment, race discrimination and retaliation against her boss, the mayor of Kansas City, his wife and the city.  Without her courage and without the teeth of the Missouri Human Rights Act, Mayor Funkhouser probably would have been reelected, since every first term mayor in Kansas City has been reelected for the past 90 years or so.

The federal discrimination statute, Title VII, did not get teeth until 1991, when Congress amended the law to allow for jury trials and provided that a jury could award compensatory and punitive damages.  Missouri's human rights law got teeth in 2003, when the Missouri Supreme Court decided that Missouri employees had a constitutional right to a jury trial in discrimination cases.  State ex rel Diehl v. O'Malley, 95 S.W.3d 82 (Mo. 2003).  Even though Title VII and the Missouri Human Rights Act (MHRA) prohibited unlawful discrimination in the 1960's, it was not until recent times that either of these statutes have had meat.  Since 1991 sexual harassment has practically been eradicated in the workplace, employers have discrimination policies, equality in society has improved.

The MHRA provides that individuals can be sued and that punitive and compensatory damages are unlimited against employers, including government employers.  These parts of the statute are currently under attack in the Missouri Legislature.  This story shows the importance of enforcing the Missouri statute as it now stands.

Ruth Bates is a quiet, hard-working college-educated woman living in Kansas City, Missouri.  Before the mayoral elections in 2007, she receives a phone call from Mark Funkhouser asking her to help him get elected as mayor.  Ruth knows Funkhouser because he worked for the city with her husband and their children had been friends.  She agrees and works hard on the campaign and asks for and receives a job in the Mayor's office.  Unbeknownst to Ruth, when she hires in to work at the mayor's office, she is earning less than one half the salary of any of the male employees hired from the campaign to work in the office.  She also discovers that the mayor's wife, who has the mouth of a sailor, is the de facto supervisor of the office.  Ruth is African-American and the mayor's wife, on multiple occasions, calls Ruth, "Mammy," and makes crude sexual remarks. Ruth complains of the pay disparity to her actual supervisor, files an EEOC charge, and is ultimately fired from the Mayor's office and told she can be a clerk in the water department.  Ruth files a lawsuit for retaliation and discrimination.

The problem with suing an elected official is that there is no one in the government who is the official's boss, except the voters.  Generally, voters don't have access to what an elected official is really like and whether or not the elected official breaks discrimination laws.  Without discrimination lawsuits, and an informed and active press, an employee who has suffered discrimination has little recourse against an elected official.  In Ruth's lawsuit, we (I was her lawyer) sued not only the City of Kansas City, but also the mayor himself and his wife.  Under the proposed amendments to the statute, neither the mayor nor his wife would be in any way personally liable for their actions.

Ruth's initial goal before filing a lawsuit was to get fair pay in light of the salaries of the men, and to get the sexual and racial comments to stop.  Ruth did not want to work with the mayor's wife.  There is a Missouri constitutional provision prohibiting nepotism.  But, this illustrates the dilemma of having constitutional provisions or statutes which are not enforced.  The city council passed a volunteer ordinance, which was declared unconstitutional.  However, no one would raise the nepotism issue who had the ability to do so (e.g. prosecutor).  Ruth asked for very little money, just for a raise and to have the mayor leave his wife at home.   The mayor stated he would not leave his wife at home, so the case was not settled.

Ruth tried informally to talk to the mayor's wife to try to make the mayor's office a place she could work.  The meeting became very contentious.  It was clear to Ruth her only alternative for justice was to file a lawsuit.  We asked the EEOC for a right to sue letter, which is required to file a lawsuit, and began to prepare the lawsuit in Missouri court.  But, even before we can file the lawsuit, the mayor fires Ruth from the mayor's office.

I filed the lawsuit.  This lawsuit was different than any other lawsuit I have ever filed.  The Mayor had no boss and no one to tell him to comply with the law.  He and his wife were angry to be a part of a lawsuit.  The press got hold of the petition and published it in the paper.  Almost every deposition was published by the Kansas City Star.  The real bosses of the mayor, the voters, were being educated about what was going on in the mayor's office.

Ruth Bates was never one to seek attention or publicity.  She shies away from the press.  It is hard on a private person to have so much notoriety.  It takes a great deal of courage to go forward and Ruth and I had no idea what Ruth was to encounter.  The depositions are a matter of public record.  In my opinion, the depositions did not go well for the mayor and his wife.  I negotiated with the lawyer representing the mayor's wife, who had an insurance company that was paying for the defense, and settled with her for $45,000.  She went on record stating how horrified she was with the insurance company because she claimed she had done nothing wrong.  

The City is obligated under its charter to pay for its exposure and the exposure of the City.  The City's lawyer approached me about settlement and we agreed on an additional $135,000.  Ruth was satisfied, because she stood up for herself and others and wanted to get on with her life.  All we needed was the approval of the City Council.  Normally, this was an easy process.  Not with this Mayor.  The Mayor had so antagonized the City Council, that they would not approve the settlement because they were angry at what he was putting the City through.  The City Council, in a three hour televised open council meeting told the mayor that if he was so adamant he and his wife had done nothing wrong, they wanted a trial.  The Mayor repeatedly entreated the Council to agree to the settlement.

I was frustrated that it looked like Ruth was being used as a political pawn.  The Mayor's individual lawyer, who was paid by City taxpayers, came to me and said that the Mayor could pay $35,000 out of his own budget and Ruth could receive a suitable job within the City and we could still proceed against the City.  My frustration with the politics of the City was nothing to compare to what happened next.

As soon as the Mayor thought he was personally off the hook, he showed his true colors.  The Mayor issued a vile and defamatory press release against Ruth, stating she had said horrendous things about the Mayor's opponent, that she had really wanted to borrow money from the mayor, etc.  Ruth was crushed by this retaliation.  The Mayor did not stop there, though.  He then, along with his lawyer, called a press conference covered by all local news stations and the newspaper stating horrendously false things about Ruth.  The Mayor's hubris and vengefulness was his downfall.  Rather than having the effect the Mayor had hoped, the public, i.e., voters, rallied behind Ruth.  There was no settlement with the Mayor, no job in City Hall for Ruth.

We prepared for trial.  On the eve of trial, the Mayor finally produced items from his computer which we had been asking for for months.  One item was particularly illuminating.  The Mayor's wife had decided to write a book about their time in the Mayor's office.  In that manuscript, which read like a diary, the Mayor's wife poured her hatred of Ruth and other employees in the Mayor's office.  This manuscript was published in the Kansas City Star.  In fact, the document gave rise to another lawsuit by another employee who was fired by the Mayor.  That lawsuit was settled days before the primary.

Armed with the depositions, the documents, and the manuscripts, Ruth was ready to go to trial.   The day before jury selection was to begin, the City Council approved an offer to Ruth of $550,000.  This combined with the $45,000 received from the Mayor's wife, amounted to $595,000.  Ruth Bates initially would have settled for less than $20,000, a pay increase, and for peace at work. 

The Mayor and his wife have consistently declared they did not do anything wrong.  In February 2011 the Mayor ran for reelection.  He didn't survive the primary.   For the last 80 or 90 years, Kansas Citians have always loved their mayors.  Every mayor, until this recent election, was voted in for a second term.  Not this mayor.  The mayor's "bosses," the electorate, spoke.  Still the Mayor and his wife believe they have not done anything wrong.Mayor interview 2/11 with Chris Hernandez

Why is this important now?  The Missouri Legislature has bills before it, HB 205 and SB 188, which will cripple the MHRA.  Even though civil rights laws have been on the books for over 50 years,  they did not become effective until they got teeth.  In 2003, the MHRA got teeth when the Missouri Supreme Court ruled that citizens had the right to jury trials under the statute.  Now, the proposed amendments, want to do away with individual liability, take away punitive damages against governments, and limit damages for pain and suffering and punitive damages to anywhere between $50,000 to $300,000.  If these amendments had been in effect, Ruth Bates would not have got justice.  Perhaps, the voters would have reelected Mayor Funkhouser.  The result would not have been good for the citizens of Kansas City.

Vote No on SB 188 - Tell the Governor

VOTE NO ON SB 188!


WHAT SB 188 WILL DO TO MISSOURI WORKERS  -

• Dillutes a 50 year old statute passed during the Civil Rights Movement protecting against religious, age, race, sex, disability discrimination

• Forces Missouri workers into federal court in St. Louis or Kansas City with federal, not Missouri law .  Federal courts throw out worthwhile cases, that's why big business wants the cases there.

• Places 20 year old federal caps on discrimination claims for even the most egregious sexual misconduct at work

• Removes individual liability for racists, sexual predators, harassers at work

• Removes governmental accountability through punitive damages for the most heinous conduct

An Editorial Response by Karen Howard

I read with great alarm Daniel Mehan’s op-ed in the KC Star about Senate Bill 188.  Not only are Mr. Mehan’s comments highly inaccurate, they are misleading and fail to inform the public as to the true impact of Senate Bill 188 on Missouri citizens.  Mr. Mehan’s misguided comments are are just the tip of the iceberg as to what is actually occurring in Missouri in the current legislative session, and that is, many Missouri legislators, at the behest of big business are very quietly destroying the rights of Missouri citizens, hoping Missouri citizens will not catch on until it is too late.

To be direct, what happened in Wisconsin is what is happening in Missouri.  The only difference is that the erosion of our rights by the business lobbyists and their “paid for” legislators in Missouri are doing it much quieter than in Wisconsin.  The business lobbyists and their paid for legislators are quickly and quietly attempting to pass bills which destroy Missouri citizens’ rights, hoping Missouri citizens will not notice.

How did this happen?  Prior to the legislative session, big business interests including the Missouri Chamber of Commerce (its president is Mehan), targeted several areas to weaken and destroy the rights of Missouri citizens.  These areas include using business’ clout and money to get bills passed which reduce corporations’ responsibility for paying the franchise tax, reduce the minimum wages of Missouri workers, restricting the rights of Missouri workers to seek compensation for work-related injuries, making Missouri a right to work state, and importantly, destroying the Missouri Human Rights Act, which provides protection to Missouri workers.

SB 188 is the bill which will destroy the strong enforcement provisions of the Missouri Human Rights Act.  Senate bill 188 makes it easier for employers and the government to fire employees because of their religious beliefs, disability, race, age and sex.  SB 188 lets the individual boss or sexual harasser completely off the hook for discriminating and retaliating.  If SB 188 passes, it will be harder, if not impossible for employees to prove discrimination.  It gives the individual wrong-doer, including workplace sexual predators a free pass to do it over and over, without accountability.

It is important to realize, that even though we do not want to believe it, there are sexual predators in the workplace.  They may work with you, or even may work in the same restaurant or store where your children work.  They may even be working at the same school where your children attend.  I have represented individuals who were assaulted in their workplace by predators, and some have been children.  The Missouri Human Rights Act helps to keep the workplace safe for Missouri citizens, including our children.   Without the Missouri Human Rights Act in its current state, there is no accountability and predators can remain in the workplace.  How would we all feel if a sexual predator is not held accountable and one of our own children becomes a victim?  We must work hard to keep the Missouri Human Rights Act as it is stated now.  The Missouri Human Rights Act helps to prevent unlawful termination.  I have represented Missouri workers who were fired, once their employer found out they had cancer or some other debilitating disease or injury.  I have represented Missouri workers who have been fired because they were “too old.”  Those individuals have been protected by the Missouri Human Rights Act.  If Senate Bill 188  is passed, employers can fire persons who are ill or disabled, or “too old”, or the wrong color or gender, without any accountability.  

The effect of Senate Bill 188 on every citizen is obvious:  When you or a member of your family needs these laws to protect you, the laws will no longer exist to protect you or your children.  And then you will ask, what happened?

Some people may think, discrimination can never happen to me or my child, but it can.  Discrimination can occur even though you are not aware of it until it actually happens to you.  You show up for work one day, and without notice you are handed an empty box to put your belongings in because you have been terminated, even though you are satisfactorily performing the duties of your job.  Security then walks you out the door in front of your co-workers.  If SB 188 has been passed, you will have no effective recourse, because SB 188 has taken away your rights.  

These business groups and the legislators who sponsor and vote for these bills are rolling back the clock on workers’ rights and safety.  But they want to do it quietly - in a whisper.  Not like Wisconsin, where when people found out, they came out of their homes and told the governor and republicans - NO.
 
Missouri citizens deserve continued protection and should not be sacrificed to the interests of big business who care only about profits and are trampling on citizens’ rights.  Big business should not rule Missouri.  As citizens, we need to stand up now and say NO.  As voters, we need to tell our representatives to listen to all of their constituency, not just the chamber of commerce and big businesses who give these legislators large campaign contributions and who then sponsor these anti-workers bills.  We need to tell our representatives to vote against Senate Bill 188 and these other bills.  Voters need to tell their representatives they will vote them out if they vote for these bills.  After all, every Missouri legislator was voted in by the people and given the responsibility to represent the people and not big business.  

Karen Howard

SB 188 Kills Jobs of Whistle Blowers by Marie Gockel

S. B. 188 KILLS JOBS OF WHISTLE BLOWERS BY HANDING EMPLOYERS A LICENSE TO RETALIATE.

Don’t be deceived – S.B. 188 replaces all existing protection of whistle blowers under Missouri’s common law with only the elusive protections of S.B. 188.  This bill – like a wolf in sheep’s clothing – reduces those protected to employees reporting actual violations of law.  S.B. 188 eliminates existing protections under Missouri common law (universally protected in other states’ Whistle Blower statutes) for employees fired for reporting in good faith what they reasonably believe to be illegal conduct.

Whistle Blowers will be silenced if only proven, actual violations of law are protected.  Whistle Blowers who lose their jobs should not bear the burden of proving criminal convictions.

Don’t be deceived – S.B. 188 also leaves unprotected employees who use traditional, internal reporting channels such as owners, partners, members of boards of directors, supervisors, managers, hot lines or ethics committees, as these traditional reporting channels are not recognized in S.B. 188 as protected.

Employers who fire Whistle Blowers should not be handed a mere technical defense that the report of illegal conduct was to the “wrong” person!

Don’t be deceived – S.B. 188 is not an act to protect “small businesses” but has been promoted by Enterprise Leasing, a multi-million dollar business.  Enterprise has tried to change the law for the past six years since a jury found it guilty for retaliatory firing of an accountant who “snitched” when Enterprise told him to juggle their numbers on an accounting report being used for investors and potential lenders.  Basically, Enterprise attempted an ENRON, got caught by the accountant, then fired him for blowing the whistle and refusing to comply with its directives.   Not only did a jury find Enterprises guilty and awarded substantial damages, the Missouri Court of Appeals agreed in Dunn v. Enterprise Leasing Company, 170 S.W.3d 1 (Mo. App. 2005) and Enterprise has tried to change the law since then.

Missouri citizens who prevent companies like Enterprise from breaking the law deserve our continued protection and should not be thrown to the wolves.

Don’t be deceived – S.B. 188 imposes statutory caps on punitive damages borrowed from 20 year old federal law, on top of already existing caps for punitive damages.  Unlike other discrimination laws, Whistle Blowers must pay their own attorneys’ fees to pursue their cases.  With 20 year old damage caps, the fear of losing one’s job for speaking out, pro-employer loopholes and the reality of footing the attorneys’ fees and costs of a lawsuit, S.B. 188 erases any incentive for Whistle Blowers to speak out against wrongdoing.

S.B. 188 eliminates incentives to report wrongdoing for fear of being fired without protection and removes incentives to pursue meritorious lawsuits.  S.B. 188 favors “killing the messenger.” 

Don’t be deceived -- S.B. 188 throws to the wolves vigilant government employees who report taxpayer fraud and wasteful spending, vigilant employees who report employers who break our immigration, securities, banking and other laws, vigilant teachers who report fraudulent spending by their school districts, vigilant nurses who report patient abuse, neglect or Medicare/Medicaid Fraud and Abuse, and others deserving of protection.

ASK THE GOVERNOR TO VETO S.B. 188

                                               

SB 188 - Tell Governor Nixon It Is Bad for Missouri by Amy Coopman

ACTION ALERT:  MISSOURI EMPLOYEE RIGHTS ARE ON THE ROPES

You need to know the Missouri Senate has passed SB 188, a bill that hurts Missouri employees, and the House is going to vote soon.  The bill will likely end up on the Governor’s desk in a matter of days.

  

Please contact Governor Nixon and tell him why SB 188 is bad for Missouri. 

Governor Jay Nixon

216 State Capitol

P.O. Box 720

Jefferson City, MO 65102
Phone: (573) 751-3222

Fax:  (573)751-1495

Email:  mogov@mail.mo.gov

SB 188 is BAD FOR MISSOURI.  WHY?

• This bill lets employers fire employees because of their religious beliefs, race, disability, age and sex.  Even worse, it gives the individual wrong-doer, including workplace sexual predators, a free pass to do it over and over, without accountability.

• The bill will let government agencies fire employees because of their age or race or sex, and pay no penalty, even though non-government employers have a penalty.  Now is not the time to make government less accountable. 

• SB 188 will make it possible for employers to hide a firing based on discrimination-- they will limit financial compensation to individuals and allow businesses to budget just how much discrimination they are willing to tolerate. 

• Under SB 188, an employee who brings a lawsuit in Missouri’s state court when he is fired due to a disability or age can find himself in front of a federal judge far from where he lives and works.  His Missouri dispute would wind up with a panel of Washington-appointed judges from outside Missouri, not accountable to Missouri voters.  Now is not the time to give Washington, DC more power over Missourians.

• The bill will threaten the religious liberty of Missouri citizens.  It significantly limits and weakens the “whistle-blower” protections that ensure that front line employees, people with the best information and knowledge about activities that this Legislature has said are illegal, can report illegal conduct by their employers without fear of losing their jobs and their ability to support their Missouri families.

• The bill lets employers have the upper hand more than ever by making it harder for employees to prove discrimination.

• SB 188 lets the individual boss or sexual harasser completely off the hook for discriminating and retaliating.  People should be accountable for their actions.

• The bill reverses the cases employees have won in court, making it easier for employers to win in the future.

• The bill will take cases out of Missouri state courts and give them to federal judges, sometimes far away from where you live and work.  Federal judges are appointed for life, and are not accountable to you like Missouri state court judges are.

• The bill lets the State of Missouri, and other governmental employers, purposely discriminate without any penalty, so they can repeatedly violate the law.

• The bill limits damages to those set by federal law 20 years ago.

• Most of the big businesses that support SB 188 aren’t even Missouri corporations, but are from Delaware or Ohio.  But they come to Missouri and ask for special treatment. This is not fair to small business in Missouri.

• Big businesses want an easier time firing Missouri workers, regardless of their age, religion, disability or gender.  Big business wants an easier time firing Missouri workers when they get “too old,” become disabled or get pregnant, or when a new boss doesn’t want people of color.  And this somehow helps create jobs?

************************************************************************************

• Please take a couple minutes –today – to tell Governor Nixon that SB 188 is bad for Missouri. 

• How to Reach the Governor:

Governor Jay Nixon
216 State Capitol

P.O. Box 720
Jefferson City, MO 65102
Phone: (573) 751-3222

Fax:  (573)751-1495

Email:  mogov@mail.mo.gov

THE MODERN VERSION OF THE 1960's LUNCH COUNTER by Marie L. Gockel

THE MODERN VERSION OF THE 1960's LUNCH COUNTER


Senator Brad Lager, the sponsor of S.B. 188, during the Senate debate, threw out the proposition that the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964 was good enough for Dr. Martin Luther King, and therefore, it should be good enough for Missouri law. The Senator, who likely never marched or held any sign for civil rights based on his age alone, acted as if he and Dr. King were in the same room when Lyndon Baines Johnson signed Title VII into law.


Yet Dr. King certainly would never have dreamed the many travesties delivered by our federal courts would be part of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Using Dr. King’s legacy in support of S.B. 188 is perverse and offensive. Why? The best way is to “show you” examples. While the list could go on and on, below are just three examples of how meritorious cases have fared in federal court – about the same way that African-Americans who wanted to be served at lunch counters in Alabama and Mississippi were treated in the 1960's – tossed and thrown out the proverbial door.


Jackson v. Flint Ink N. Am. Corp., 370 F.3d 791, 793-96 (8th Cir. 2004), modified on reh'g by 382 F.3d 869 (8th Cir. 2004). The 8 th Circuit affirmed the dismissal of this case and found that no racially hostile work environment existed, and where managers and coworkers referred to plaintiff as "that damn n____" and "n____"; used the phrases "damn black," "n____-rigging," and "f__ing n_____"; stated "[w]e don't listen to that damn black music around here, n___ shit, radio"; and there was evidence of graffiti of a burning cross with the letters "KKK" surrounding it.


Woodland v. Joseph T. Ryerson & Son, Inc., 302 F.3d 839, 843-44 (8th Cir. 2002). This case dismissed, finding that no racially hostile work environment existed where plaintiff had been told by a coworker on three occasions that another employee had used a racial epithet in referring to plaintiff; on two other occasions, plaintiff heard about racial epithets directed towards other African-American employees; there were graffiti drawings of "KKK," a swastika, and a hooded figure; and copies of a racially derogatory poem were "strewn about the plant."


LeGrand v. Area Resources for Community and Human Services, 394 F.3d 1098 (8th Cir. 2005). The following conduct was deemed not sufficiently severe or threatening to establish a hostile work environment based on sex under federal law and therefore, the case was dismissed: (1) Father Nutt asked LeGrand to watch pornographic movies and masturbate together to relieve stress; (2) Father Nutt suggested LeGrand would advance within the company if LeGrand watched the movies and performed sex acts on Father Nutt; (3) Father Nutt admittedly hugged and kissed LeGrand on the mouth; (4) Father Nutt admittedly brushed LeGrand's crotch with the back of Father Nutt's hand because he thought LeGrand was stimulated by the hug; (5) Father Nutt grabbed LeGrand's buttocks; and (6) Father Nutt gripped LeGrand's thigh under the conference table at a meeting.


Let’s just be honest about the purposes of S.B. 188 – steering Missouri discrimination cases into federal courts to maximize those to be thrown out without jury trials. In other words, protecting businesses and individuals who discriminate, and not protecting the victims of discrimination. Let’s not manipulate the legacy of Dr. King as S.B. 188's sponsor.