Overturned!
Posted on 01/16/2008 6:34:08 PM PST by NormsRevenge
An appeals court has overturned a $1.5 million verdict awarded to a woman who was spanked in front of co-workers in what her employer called a camaraderie-building exercise.
A jury in 2006 had ruled that Janet Orlando had suffered sexual harassment and sexual battery when she was paddled on the rear end at home security company Alarm One Inc. The jury punished the company with a $1 million punitive damage award.
But on Monday, a unanimous three-judge panel of the state Court of Appeal overturned that verdict, ruling that the jury had been given improper instructions. In particular, the jury wasn't instructed that one vital element of proving that sexual harassment occurred is showing the action was directed at a woman because of her gender.
Lawyers for Alarm One, an Anaheim-based, 300-employee company, said the spankings were not discriminatory because they were given to both male and female workers and that Orlando and others willingly took part.
Orlando's attorney, Nicholas "Butch" Wagner, vowed to take the case to trial again.
"We may get more this time," Wagner said.
But K. Poncho Baker, the attorney who defended the company at trial in 2006, said because the company has since gone into bankruptcy and that its insurance was exhausted battling Orlando's claim and settling with three other co-workers, there may be little left to recover.
"Good luck retrying this one," Baker said.
Orlando quit the company in 2004, less than a year after she was hired at the Fresno office, saying she was humiliated during the company's team-building practices.
Employees were paddled with rival companies' yard signs as part of a contest that pitted sales teams against each other. The winners poked fun at the losers, throwing pies at them, feeding them baby food, making them wear diapers and swatting their buttocks.
The company has since abandoned the practice.
Spanked at work? I have to go to a special “clinic” for that.
how could the company does this in today’s litigious society? This was a dozen different lawsuit claims waiting to happen. Presumably the insurer didn’t know this was going on either.
Shocking that a company with a work environment like that would go bankrupt.
must be a long line.. ;-)
Ya just don’t see ‘We Spank Employees! We’re Hiring!’ signs in the window like ya used to..
Looks like Spanky and her gang lost that one!
Employees were paddled with rival companies' yard signs as part of a contest that pitted sales teams against each other. The winners poked fun at the losers, throwing pies at them, feeding them baby food, making them wear diapers and swatting their buttocks.
And nobody walked out? Or at least punched out the facilitators?
I don’t get it. Was Orlando, if that’s her real name, overturned before being spanked or afterwards?
SPANKING PINGIE!
Was this in the Castle Anthrax?
Hopefully this spells the end of these stupid “team building exercises”. Crackpot psychology at best.
I'd imagine so, since the company is bankrupt.
lolie
Ghost Who Walks gets kinky in the Skull Cave.
Wait, they got spanked for free? I paid, ahh I mean, I know a guy who had to pay a lot of money for that!
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