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Male Employees' Sex Harassment Case Settles

By Alyson M. Palmer
September 29, 2010

Lawyers watching a sexual harassment case that tested the limits of acceptable workplace behavior will not get to hear what the full Eleventh U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals thinks of the matter. The case against Home Depot, heard in a rare en banc session by the full appeals court bench in June, has been settled. The court dismissed the appeal following a joint motion by the parties. Corbitt v. Home Depot U.S.A., No. 08-12199.

Background

The case, in which two male employees had claimed that a male manager made inappropriate sexual overtures to them, had taken a long and unusual route to a full court hearing. The court's announcement of the en banc argument and comments at the June oral argument indicated that the judges were wrestling with how to apply a January decision by the full court in another sexual harassment case. In that case, the court ruled that while not all profane or sexual language could support a sexual harassment suit, certain gender-specific words, such as “bitch” or “whore,” could be actionable even when they were not used explicitly in reference to the plaintiff. That ruling said courts must examine complained-of remarks and actions cumulatively and in the context.

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