When work turns hostile.
No one should have to trade their dignity for a paycheck. When an employer harasses, discriminates, or punishes you for speaking up, the law is on your side, and so is this firm, which represents employees across California, Washington, Texas, Nevada and Colorado.
Harassment and discrimination take more than one form, but they share a root: you are treated worse because of who you are, or punished for objecting to it. The law protects you from both, and from retaliation for reporting either. It costs nothing to find out where you stand, and the first conversation is private.
What we handle.
Harassment at work takes more than one form. The firm handles all of them, and the retaliation that so often follows a complaint.
Sexual harassment
Unwanted advances, a manager who ties your job to going along with it, or a workplace made hostile because of your sex.
Sexual harassmentRacial and other harassment
Slurs, mockery, or being targeted because of your race, national origin, religion, age or disability, when it is severe or pervasive enough to poison your workplace, it is unlawful.
Harassment based on who you areDiscrimination
Paid less, passed over for promotion, disciplined harder, or pushed out because of a protected characteristic rather than your work.
Discrimination at workRetaliation
Fired, demoted, or punished after you reported harassment or discrimination, or after you backed up a coworker who did.
Retaliation and wrongful terminationPay and promotion discrimination
Doing the same work for less, or watching less-qualified people advance, because of who you are rather than what you do.
Proving pay discriminationWrongful termination
Let go for an unlawful reason, reporting misconduct, taking protected leave, or exercising a legal right at work.
Wrongful terminationWhat may be available.
What a claim can recover depends on the facts, the specific claim, the employer, and the state, and only after a covered claim is proven. When a claim succeeds, relief may include:
Wages and benefits you may recover if you were fired, demoted, forced out, or denied a raise or promotion because of unlawful conduct.
Compensation for the harm the conduct caused, and, where the law allows and the conduct was egregious, additional damages, subject to limits that vary by state.
Harassment and discrimination claims have filing deadlines, and some are short. The sooner you ask, the more of your options stay open. See deadlines by state →
A firm that tries these cases.
Ackermann & Tilajef has represented workers in sexual and racial harassment, pay and promotion discrimination, and retaliation, individual and multi-plaintiff, through settlement, trial and appeal.
See the recordCommon questions.
Do I have to prove the harassment was illegal to be protected for reporting it?
Often no. If you opposed conduct you reasonably and in good faith believed was unlawful, and communicated that opposition, explicitly or implicitly, in a reasonable way, you can be protected even if the underlying harassment is never proven. Taking part in an agency investigation or charge is protected under a separate, broader rule. Either way, a retaliation claim can stand on its own.
What if it was a coworker, not my boss?
It can still be the employer's responsibility, though the standard depends on who harassed you. For a coworker, or, in some cases, a non-employee such as a customer, the employer is generally liable when it knew or should have known and failed to take reasonable corrective action, with its degree of control a factor. When the harasser is a supervisor, liability is broader and can attach even without prior notice. Either way, reporting it and how the employer responded matter.
I wasn't fired, I just couldn't take it anymore and quit. Do I still have a case?
Possibly, this is called constructive discharge, and the bar is high. It generally requires conditions so intolerable that a reasonable person would have had no reasonable alternative but to resign, that the employer intentionally created or knowingly permitted those conditions, and that they were unusually aggravated or continuous rather than a single incident. Whether your situation meets that standard is exactly what a free review can assess.
Is the review really free?
Yes. The initial review has no cost or obligation. The firm will review what you share and contact you about possible options and next steps. Bring what you have, messages, emails, notes, names of witnesses.