A former state employee has filed a lawsuit against the director of a state board alleging discrimination, retaliation and wrongful termination after her shirtless boss asked her to rub lotion on her.
However, an attorney for the New Mexico Board of Examiners for Architects said Monday the allegations in the lawsuit had been investigated and found to be unsubstantiated.
Lorraine Otero, who had been a civil servant since 2008, filed the suit in state District Court against her former supervisor, Melarie Gonzales, last week. The complaint alleges that Gonzales, who is the director of the New Mexico Board of Examiners for Architects, repeatedly harassed Otero before wrongfully firing her.
The lawsuit also names the State Personnel Office and the architect examiner board as defendants.
Gonzales allegedly called Otero into her office in early March 2018 and asked her to rub lotion onto her back and neck, according to the lawsuit, which seeks monetary compensation and financial damages for loss of employment and emotional distress endured after that event and other incidents of harassment.
The legal filing said Otero complied with the request despite feeling extremely uncomfortable. She faced repeated bullying which led to extreme anxiety, insomnia and post-traumatic stress disorder after her supervisor asked Otero to rub lotion on her skin again, a few days later, the filing said.
"But this time ... Gonzales removed her blouse," the complaint said. "Faced with a partially disrobed supervisor demanding that [Gonzales] rub lotion into her naked skin, [Otero] was more uncomfortable than ever."
Otero decided to dab just "a small amount of lotion" on Gonzales' neck, who demanded that she "Rub harder!" according to the lawsuit.
In a phone call with The New Mexican, Gonzales said she was not aware of the lawsuit and offered no comment about its allegations.
After a follow-up email to Gonzales, a spokeswoman for Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham sent a prepared statement from John Stiff, an attorney for the Board of Examiners for Architects.
"The allegations made in this lawsuit have been previously investigated and dismissed as unsubstantiated by the State Personnel Office and the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission," Stiff said. "The claimant chose to appeal to the 1st Judicial District Court, as is her right."
The suit claims Otero faced repeated harassment after that event, including hostility, arbitrary deadlines, demands that she personally request permission from Gonzales to take breaks and receive tools she needed to complete daily tasks, and an incident in which her supervisor demanded for the first time that she do manual labor after returning to work following a severe burn on her hand.
The lawsuit also alleges that "about twenty times per day ... Gonzales would walk back and forth by [Otero's] cubicle" to stare at her, among other examples of alleged harassment.
Otero was diagnosed by her doctor with amnesia, PTSD and insomnia during her employment at the board. Her application for workers' compensation was denied and she was fired after taking leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act.
Her requests to be transferred to another position in state government under a different supervisor were also denied, and a State Personnel Office investigation into Otero's harassment claim was "inconclusive," the lawsuit says.
The suit alleges that another former employee who worked under Gonzales used to "call colleagues crying about harassment" and eventually resigned because of a hostile work environment at the board.
"lotion" - Google News
December 24, 2019 at 10:13AM
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Lawsuit: New Mexico official demanded employee rub her with lotion - Santa Fe New Mexican
"lotion" - Google News
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