Toronto Woman Wins Sex Discrimination Ruling Against (Former) Staubach Company

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Colin McConnell/Toronto Star

There’s no such thing as sexual discrimination in male-oriented businesses, right?

Kathrine Farris was 26 years old in 1997 when she began working for a Toronto commercial real estate company that entered into a licensing agreement with The Staubach Company. Name sound familiar? It’s the Dallas-based real estate firm founded by former NFL star quarterback and all-around great guy Roger Staubach. The Staubach company was acquired by the (originally British-based) commercial real estate giant, Jones Lang Lasalle in 2008.

But in that Toronto office, Farris says she became part of an unfair environment where most of the men held the high-end positions and most of the women were support staff. It was an environment in which the Ontario Human Rights Commission alleged Farris “was viewed as an atypical woman and held in disdain for it” and where Farris became the victim of a false and “vicious sexual rumour” that said she was sleeping with a guy named McKeague, who happened to be her boss. Farris says she wasn’t, and was not happy about the allegations.

In 2001, Farris began raising concerns over sexual discrimination at the office. A member of management hired a psychologist to figure out what was going on and implement an office policy, but the sexual discrimination, she says, did not stop.

Farris filed claim for sexual discrimination with the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario on June 13, 2003. Five days later she was fired.

Now, eight years after that firing, the Ontario tribunal has awarded Farris $30,000 as compensation. She’d be thrilled, she says, if she weren’t still out $400,000 in legal fees for a civil case against the office that’s yet to be heard: she awaits a ruling in a $7.5 million wrongful dismissal and harassment suit filed against her former employers and colleagues in 2003.

This case is interesting because traditionally, commercial real estate is a man’s world — very few women dare to roll up their sleeves to work in the fraternity house. But more women are infiltrating commercial real estate, and it will be interesting to see if reverberations from this case, which is based on Canadian law ruling, will be imported into the USA.

Candy Evans

Candy Evans

4 Comments

  1. Candy Evans on May 26, 2011 at 10:59 pm

    Is this a dumb post
    ? Why did I post this?



  2. Candy Evans on May 26, 2011 at 10:59 pm

    Is this a dumb post
    ? Why did I post this?



  3. The Lynch List, 27-May-2011 « The Lynch Mob on May 27, 2011 at 12:05 pm

    […] has awarded $30,000 in damages for sexual harassment in the workplace while civil litigation (to the tune of 7.5 million) is ongoing. Think the OHRT case will have an influence on the civil […]



  4. The Lynch List, 27-May-2011 « The Lynch Mob on May 27, 2011 at 12:05 pm

    […] has awarded $30,000 in damages for sexual harassment in the workplace while civil litigation (to the tune of 7.5 million) is ongoing. Think the OHRT case will have an influence on the civil […]