EEOC v. Management Hospitality of Racine, Inc.
United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
666 F.3d 422 (7th Cir. 2012)
Two teenage servers, Shisler and Powell (plaintiffs, through the EEOC), worked at a restaurant owned by Management Hospitality of Racine (MHR) (defendant), where assistant manager Gutierrez subjected both to frequent, explicit sexual comments and humiliation in front of coworkers. Both women reported the conduct to assistant manager Del Rio and general manager Dahl, both of whom dismissed the complaints without action, even though MHR had a formal anti-harassment policy requiring manager-delivered training. A jury found MHR liable for the hostile work environment under Title VII; MHR appealed, arguing it had established the affirmative defense that it exercised reasonable care to prevent and correct harassment and that the plaintiffs unreasonably failed to use available reporting channels.
Whether an employer can avoid vicarious liability for a supervisor's sexual harassment of a subordinate by showing it exercised reasonable care to prevent or correct the harassment and that the victimized employee unreasonably failed to use available preventive or corrective measures.