Definition of "Hostile Work Environment" Expanded by U.S. District Court

A recent decision by the United States District Court in New York has expanded the concept of a "hostile work environment" as constituting grounds for a sexual harassment lawsuit in the federal courts, holding that, even where a plaintiff was not harassed herself, the harassment of others can create a work environment which violates federal law.

In Leibovitz v New York City Transit Authority, File No. 95-CV-3860 (EDNY, 1998), the plaintiff was a supervisor who became depressed and anxious after learning that other female employees were being sexually harassed. Although the plaintiff had not been harassed herself, when the Transit Authority delayed in investigating her complaints about the harassment of her co-workers, she sued. Her lawsuit claimed that the Transit Authority's indifference to sexual harassment altered the conditions of her employment, by creating a workplace permeated with sexual misconduct. A jury awarded the plaintiff $60,000.

In upholding the jury verdict, the District Court stated that the fact that the plaintiff was never personally harassed did not bar her lawsuit, relying on testimony that the plaintiff was emotionally injured by the harassment to her co-workers. The court went on to state that personal harassment is not necessary for a hostile work environment claim, and that excluding causes of action where the work environment is hostile, but the person complaining about the environment had not been personally attacked, would create confusion about what a "work environment" was.

While the District Court did not decide whether a male employee could sue for the sexual harassment of female co-workers, the decision seems to indicate that such lawsuits would be possible, as long as the person filing the lawsuit was reasonably damaged by the harassment. The strongest cases, however, will likely involve a plaintiff who is the same sex as those being harassed, and has regular contact with the harassment victims.