WOMAN AWARDED $2 MILLION IN SEXUAL HARASSMENT SUIT
A
Louisville, Kentucky woman was awarded $2 million after claiming she was
forced to leave her job as a plant supervisor for Philip Morris USA
because of sexual harassment.
A Jefferson
Circuit Court jury, after 11 hours of deliberations, awarded Mary Wilson
compensatory damages for humiliation, embarrassment and mental anguish.
She had been seeking $13 million.
Wilson had
been on medical leave since March 1993. She sued Philip Morris in
February, 1994, alleging that she suffered through more than a year of
sexual harassment by men she supervised in the Louisville plant.
Wilson's
attorney said her mental health has been badly damaged by the experience
and submitted her medical records for review during jury deliberations.
Both Wilson
and the company agreed that after she complained of the harassment,
Philip Morris sent the three men in question to sexual-harassment
counseling, after which the sexual comments stopped.
But Wilson
alleged the men engaged in a retaliatory work slowdown, and when she
complained to her supervisors about that, the company offered to move
her to another department. She refused.
