Faragher v. Boca Raton

Frargher v. The City of Boca Raton, Florida

CAPTION / CITATION: Faragher v. Boca Raton, 524 U.S. 775 (1998)

The issue argued was whether an employer can be held liable under title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for the actions of an employee who has created a hostile work environment due to sexually harassing behavior towards other subordinates in the workplace.

FACTS: Beth Ann Faragher was a lifeguard in the city of Boca Raton, Florida. She held that she was subjected to sexually harassing comments and inappropriate touching by supervisors in her position as a lifeguard for the city. Faragher filed complaints with a regional supervisor who failed to report those complaints to Marine Safety Section directors or to city officials. Faragher resigned from her position in 1990 and in 1992 she filed a lawsuit against the City of Boca Raton, Florida for sexual harassment.

COURT DECISION: In 1998, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that an employer is liable under title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for actions of discrimination or harassment that a supervisor may make against an employee in the workplace. The court noted that liability is based on reasonable actions of the employer to prevent or address workplace harassment. In addition, the actions of the plantiff and victim must be taken into consideration.

COURT RATIONALE: Supreme Court Justice Souter noted in a brief to the court that the city of Boca Raton had, "entirely failed to disseminate its policy against sexual harassment among the beach employees and that its officials made no attempt to keep track of the conduct of supervisors like [Faragher's], u]nder such circumstances, we hold as a matter of law that the City could not be found to have exercised reasonable care to prevent the supervisors' harassing conduct." The Court noted that Boca Raton had not take action to ensure proper employee supervision and harassment reporting. Without such systems properly in place, the victim of the harassment had no proper avenue to report and stop the harassment.

DISSENTING OPINION: Dissenting opinions in the case focused on the fact that Faragher had reported incidents of harassment to Marine Safety Lieutenant and Training Captain Robert Gordon, the regional supervisor. Gordon did not report the complaints to other city officials. Dissenting opinions in the case, including findings of the Eleventh Circuit held that the city could not be found liable for harassment of which it had no "constructive knowledge."