$1,700,000.00 – Jane Doe v. National Gym Chain [sexual harassment]

Facts and Allegations:

A 27 year-old female personal trainer was sexually harassed by her supervisor. The supervisor was reprimanded previously when he made sexually inappropriate comments to a female client. After that, he would make comments to the personal trainer, such as, “Damn, did your butt get bigger?” “Why is your butt so big?” “Your butt is making me hard,” “I want to stick my face in your butt.” The supervisor placed his hands on the plaintiff’s buttocks when she bent over to retrieve a client file from the file cabinet.

On one occasion, the supervisor sent the plaintiff a SnapChat of him masturbating. On another occasion, the supervisory closed the door in a room at the gym, and digitally penetrated the plaintiff. The supervisor also stated he could “starve or feed any of his employees depending on whether they were working for or against whatever he wanted.”

After the national gym chain was apprised of the allegations, it filed bankruptcy. Hogue & Belong was able to obtain a relief from the automatic stay to pursue the case to eventual resolution.