Chili's Fires* Long-Time Employee After Sexual Harassment Claim [UPDATED]
When my sister, Rachel Spicuglia, a five-year employee of Chili's Restaurant (owned by Brinker International), reported to her manager the escalating sexual harassment she was receiving from the cooks, which had culminated in an assault that morning in the walk-in refrigerator, the manager asked Rachel if the offending employee had gotten a "full cup" when he had grabbed her breasts. Shocked that the manager would joke in such way, Rachel protested that it wasn't funny, but he insisted that it was actually information that he needed to know.
Rachel ended up taking a leave of absence, filing EEOC Charge of Discrimination on August 12, but she continued to work with Chili's to arrange transfer to another store. The transfer was approved, but Rachel's calls to the store manager were never returned, and on December 9, Rachel received a letter from her health insurance, saying that her medical benefits were denied, due to the fact that she was terminated from her job. Two weeks before Christmas, without any warning, and still waiting for the EEOC to review her complaint. Apparently, Chili's was unable to fire Rachel during her leave of absence, but under Georgia law, unlike other states, you can suffer sexual harassment and be fired.
Rachel is 28, a musician, and a hard-working server who has worked in restaurants since she was 16 years old. She has resisted the big money to be made in higher-end restaurants, or even by taking dinner shifts at Chili's, because working the Monday through Friday day shifts have allowed her to play music at night, and to spend nights and weekends with her family.
A model employee for Chili's, Rachel has won many store competitions, getting great customer feedback, and as she has traveled and performed in several states, she has worked in Chili's in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Arkansas, Nevada, and Georgia. In the two years that she has been at the Kennesaw, GA restaurant, she always ranked in the top 5 servers (out of about 60), and often ranked #1. Rachel loved her job and was not only a nice person to work with, but a reliable worker. She's also someone who has tried to avoid getting anyone in trouble, even when she tore a tendon in her ankle 2 years ago and her manager simply wrapped it in a bandage and put her back on the floor.
Rachel's coworkers enjoyed working with her, as she is friendly, a great listener, and a giver of hugs. The sexual harassment started ten months prior to her EOC filing, when a cook named Juan grabbed Rachel's butt when she gave him a hug. She told him not to touch her in that way, and never hugged him again. The harassment increased and became a running joke in the kitchen, where some of the cooks would coordinate with Juan, as he would follow Rachel into the walk-in, and one of them would turn the lights off. She had reported these incidents to her manager, Kathy, who laughed it off as a harmless prank, and did nothing to stop the harassment, which had included inappropriate touching and hands shoved down her pants.
In late spring 2008, after Rachel reported the assault to her manager Bowie, he spoke to Juan (unclear whether he was given an official company warning). While the sexual harassment stopped for a brief time, the cooks began causing trouble for her in the kitchen, refusing to make her food or give her the side dishes her customers had asked for. And two weeks later, she was assaulted again, a pattern that continued until a couple months later, when Rachel's general manager, Cindy, was managing. When Rachel reported the harassment to her, Cindy offered to write Juan up. Appalled at such a minor penalty, Rachel emphasized the level of abuse, and the fact that he had been previously warned. Cindy told Rachel that Juan didn't understand English - which was not only untrue (he does speak English) but seemed to be an excuse for behavior that Rachel had made clear was unacceptable. Rachel left work that day, and through a lawyer requested a leave of absence under the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA), subsequently filing a charge of discrimination.
However, Rachel's lawyer, Steve Mixon, notes: "You can't just sue. You have to go through the EEOC [Equal Employment Opportunity Commission], which can take a month, or multiple months to have an investigator assign to your case." Mixon noted that it is in the interests of the employer - in this case Brinker International - to procrastinate, as many witnesses who might be willing to come forward are transient due to typical staff turnover in the service industry.
This is a direct result of the slashing of EEOC budget under the Bush Administration, which lacks the funds and staff it needs to protect women like Rachel. It has not only been under a hiring freeze since 2001, it has dramatically cut staff, most of them in enforcement. There are a mere 5 investigators covering the entire state of Georgia, as well as large portions of South Carolina. Needless to say there is a backlog of thousands of cases. Potential new cases are put off by the difficulty of filing, and often they are told to return or call back at a later time, because there is no one to do the intake.
As a Georgia resident, Rachel is fortunate that she is even eligible to file. While sexual harassment is a form of sex discrimination that violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, under Title VII, employees working for small businesses vulnerable in states like Georgia that have no state law to cover the gaps. "It's a systemic problem," said Mixon. "In Georgia, we do not have much enforcement in the area of sex harassment. My understanding is that in California and other states, most lawyers there don't use federal law because they are so ineffective. They use state laws instead."
Since Rachel filed her claim and took her leave of absence, the economy has gone south. She never wanted to lose her job with Chili's. Unfortunately, the corporation chose to penalize a five-year employee who prided herself in her work, in a vulnerable economic time, and without any warning. Rachel had just written a large check for medical expenses, that she now has to wait for a refund for, even as she needs to secure alternate, more expensive, heath coverage elsewhere. It's Happy Holidays from Chili's Restaurant!
*Update: Since this post was published Tuesday morning, Brinker International has contacted Rachel's lawyer, informing him that Rachel's termination was a computer error. Rachel has since been reinstated with Chili's. Check back for further updates.
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Sadly, this does not surprise me. My former employer, Touchstone Wireless, fired an acquaintance of mine after she filed a claim of sexual harassment against her lead. She found his level of touchy-feeliness especially discomforting and had told him so repeatedly. When she filed her claim she was asked if she was willing 'to ruin someone's life over a slap on the butt' and pressured to drop her claim. When she insisted on filing her claim, she was fired for 'huffing contact lens fluid.' Sexual harassment is no big deal, but Touchstone Wireless takes a firm stand against the abuse of the dangerous narcotic saline!
The problem with employment laws go far beyond gaps in sexual harassment laws, sadly. The majority of states are now 'At Will Employee' states in which there simply is no wrongful termination unless illegal discrimination takes place. I myself was fired for 'absenteeism' when my partner got sick. Because we are not legally married, I was turned down for Family Medical Leave and fired for calling in to care for her. The balance of power between employer and employee is worse than ever, and less is being done about it than ever.
touching her like that is assault, not harassment.
Touching her like that once may be assault, but a repeated pattern is what makes it harassment.
Touching her like that is sexual battery to be precise. If Juan had physically hurt her, then it would have been sexual assault, and then he would likely have gone to jail.
Repeated instances of such sexual degradation are harassment, pure and simple, and it is unfathomable why Chili’s would want to tolerate such behaviour in the workplace with any of their employees.
I'm 53 years old. I learned by the time I was 25 to keep my mouth shut about sexual haressment, YOU will always be the "trouble-maker" for not taking it like a good sport. The EEOC has NEVER done a darn thing for women. By the time I was 40 I learned that age discrimination does exist and the EEOC does nothing for older Americans. Welcome to the Real America. It's ALL smoke and mirrors. From Wall Street to Government.. America plain sucks.
I'm not surprised that this happened in Georgia, as generally the South turns a "deaf ear" on these kinds of things. In fact, most Southern women just seem to laugh it off along with the guys. You didn't mention in the article whether Rachel was a transplant to Georgia from another state. I'm a West coast transplant living in the South and can tell you that the typical West Coast greeting in the form of a friendly, innocent hug, is often misconstrued by native Southerners, who generally regard hugging people outside of immediate family etc. as a sexual "come-on". My first instinct as a former Westerner, is to hug everybody men and women alike, but I've since learned that the South is not the place where hugs can be given as freely as in the West. Unfortunately, as a woman, you'll be chased forever, if you dare breech this time-honored, conservative Southern protocol.
I've had the opposite experience. No one ever hugged in California on the same scale I find myself hugged here in Tennessee. The female half of the only other couple my partner and I are friends with hugs us both equally, myself (male) and my female partner. The majority of our friends in California, regardless of gender, were far less huggy than our friends here.
Southern women just seem to laugh at "sexual harassment" at a Chili's because we thought it was part of the job description. I consider women who work at strip clubs to be less offensive than waitresses at Chili's. You have on almost no clothes, and the few that exist are too tight. I only surmise this from the commercials, I would never step foot in one of these places.
You work at a place that tries to sell burgers by making its waitresses look like hoochy-mommas.
I am sorry the young woman was offended, but this resturant advertises itself as a place staffed by young buxom women with few clothes on. Who do they think is going to be attracted to such a work environment, Sir Gallahad?
Perhaps you've confused Chili's with Hooters? The Chili's up the road does not meet the description you provide. Perhaps it's different in the South.
I think this person is confused. Chili's is a family restaurant where they were pants and polo's!
The big problem in a out of control workplace is when management does not do its job, the corporate offices deny or not even acknowledge the disgrace. The Corporate lobbyists have controlled the 2 party system and have downgraded the worker/citizens power for recourse. Mr. Ralph Nader states that most of the consumer citizen gains that were made (with his leadership) were eroded by the tapestry of corporate controlled politics. He says it is very hard to sue corporates (like Chilis) for the average person, and there are limits of $250,000. I am afraid that Obama is going to disapoint me and support the great greed of corporate America instead of the people. Its We the People, not we the corporation.
I was thinking their Baby Back ribs were too dry anyway.
It's been ruled that Corporations are "people," hasn't it? Until that's reversed, we're screwed forever.
UNBELEIVABLE! Have we stepped back into the stone ages? I cannot believe that this was allowed and on top of that they fired her. Sounds like she's got a good lawsuit on her hands and I hope that she takes this as far as she can so these sorts of things will STOP! Chili's you can be sure you have lost my business.
I was an employee of Brinker International for ten years with Macaroni Grill, and can safely say that Rachel's experience is in NO WAY a reflection of the company's practices. Frankly, I have seen many cases like this come and go, and have never seen a case where Brinker failed to react in a manner that was so blatantly retaliatory. First and foremost, if Rachel felt that she was being harassed and that the managers were not taking care of the problem, she should have gone to the General Manager, then to the Area Director, then to the District Manager, and finally to the HR department. Brinker has always taken issues of sexual harassment VERY seriously, and clearly states in its employee handbook the correct procedures to follow. If an employee is unaware of the chain of command, perhaps there needs to be more specific information posted with the numbers of who they should call in the event that their situations are not handled properly.
I was a hostessfor a Chili's in Tennessee when I was 17/18 years old. I was also a victim of sexual harassment, but had a very different experience than your sister (I am so sorry for what she's going through). When I informed my managers (both male) of everything that had transpired for the past several months, they immediately suspended the waiter who had harassed me. The following day they fired him- they told me that corporate advised them to just go ahead and fire the guy to avoid any problems. I don't know if my situation was different b/c I was only 17 at the time, or if I just lucked out with very compassionate managers, but this is shocking and unacceptable. Best of luck with everything, I really hope your sister gets justice!!
I don't know if you're much older than 17 now but do you really think of what happened as justice?
Basically you got a man fired based on only your word against his. His bosses took the attitude of "there's no down side to booting him". I assume you feel that whatever happened to you was so bad it warranted firing someone who might have been providing for a family. No due process. No investigation. No rights. Just, "oh whatever - just give him the boot".
Were you ever tempted to threaten other male workers with getting them fired by making an accusation against them?
If not, that's a good thing, but make no mistake there are people who would. The managers were not "compassionate". Possibly a sense of "chivalry" (ie gender prejudice against men and for women) motivated them. But corporate were covering their asses and acted without compassion justice or mercy it seems to me. Imagine if you had been the one fired either due to real bad behaviour or else a false accusation.
Bullying shouldn't be tolerated there's a lot you can do to make sure bullies know it won't be tolerated without firing them.
What crap!
Do you think a company is going to take crime scene photos and fingerprints to "prove" that a person has been sexually harassed? And it doesn't even have to be physical and often isn't.
Sexual harassment is against the law. It it usually discussed in company and employ handbooks with the stated outcome that if you do it, you're gone. Ignorance or expecting to have a company spend lots of time in situations where there is plainly a pattern is ludicrous.
Most people who practice sexual harassment don't take warnings to heart. Instead, they up the ante and continue on with what they think should be acceptable and cool. The only way to fix an uncontrollable animal is to put it out the door.
Under the proper adjudication of existing law, all 'harassment' is illegal whether sexual or not. From this comment and a comment on the original post, you appear to believe there is some sort of gender imbalance in harassment laws. There isn't, and what you call 'bullying' constitutes legal harassment if done in the workplace. Furthermore, you appear to believe that disciplinary action against people whose behavior is inappropriate is more unjust then the decision to mistreat one's coworkers or employees.
Are there people who are oversensitive? Yes, there are, but there are also 'bullies' (to use your word) who are particularly objectionable. The test of whether or not someone is merely being oversensitive is whether or not the problem continues after measures are taken to inform the 'bully' that one feels 'bullied' and whether or not the employer takes against the 'bully'.
Equating legitimate complaints of harassment as sexist is ridiculous. Claiming that laws only protect one gender against one kind of harassment is either ignorant or dishonest.
matthew - your repeated use of the word "bullying" instead of "harassment" says a lot about you. And I have to ask: your question about imagining "if you had been the one fired due to real bad behavior..." Are you implying we should feel sorry for the perp? And not the victim?
Matt, do you spring to the defense of bullies everywhere or do you just have something in particular against women who take steps to deal with harassers?
It is much easier to hire a server than it is to find a decent cook.
people still eat at CHILIS? WHY?
Just to let your know. I'll never eat at Chili's again and will tell all my friends about this.
I will not patronize Chili's until Rebecca writes another column in the Huffington Post, telling her readers that Chili's behaved responsibly and obeyed the law. I was a waitress during my college years and I know the crap I had to put up with; I just didn't realize that it was still going on.
Bad call, Chili's manager.
BAAAAH....BAAAAH said the little sheep.
I almost thought you were kidding, sadly, you're not.
In response to the article concerning Rachel, several important facts warrant clarification which could have been accomplished by contacting our media relations team prior to publishing the story. Rachel has not been terminated and remains a full-time team member at Chili's. We apologize for any confusion which arose from her interaction with one of our benefit providers. We are working with that provider to clarify her continued employment at Chili's. Just as important, Brinker does not condone sexual harassment or retaliation and has strict policies and procedures in place for dealing with such claims. We work to train all team members on this issue to create a greater understanding of its effect and consequences.
So Rachel's sister says she's fired and you, "BrinkerSpokeswoman" say she has not? Hmmmm.... Who to believe? Who to believe?! I'm sure you've already contacted Rachel and explained your fault as well as offered compensation for Rachel's hassle.
Rebekah - I'll be telling everyone I know about Chili's handling of the situation. I worked on an EEOC contract when they were still outsourcing intake and so I know two things: It's going to be a long wait before anything is done and Georgia is not the place to live if you want discrimination protection! I will never live in Georgia based on nothing more than the intake I handled at the EEOC.
I am the attorney who represents Rachel at the EEOC. If any of you have had specific experiences with Chilies or other Brinker International restaurants (Maggiano's, Macaroni Grill, On the Border, etc) regarding sexual harassment and you are willing to be a witness please let me know. You can contact me at mixon-law.comaw.com Thank you in advance. Steve Mixon
Why would anyone want to eat at places like Chili's or Applebee's, or any "chain restaurant" for that matter? It's all corporate food at it's worst!
I like those restaurants a lot. I've enjoyed every experience I've had at those restaurants. That's why.
I don't frequent big chain restaurants to begin with, and now Chili's is off the list entirely. It is appalling that a female manager would respond this way, but some people would still say that you have to go along to get along.
I hope your sister is able to find something much, much better.
Obviously it is not any more or less "appalling" that two out of three of her managers who ignored the complaints were women.
But I would guess that attitude is more common among women because women are not subject to the rules of "chivalry" which says men have to protect women over the interests of other men (ie discriminate in women's favour). A woman would be more likely to think "Geez, suck it up and quit complaining!" OTOH a man would be more likely to completely over react I would guess.
As a male head coach of a girl's high school basketball team in Texas, I can attest to the difficulty of getting any support from the EEOC. While witnesses were plentiful and I hired my own attorney to pursue the case against the School district, the ultimate decision not to prosecute was made by some attorney I never did meet.
Until the people at the top insist that equality isn't just an 8 letter word, this will continue to be an area of benign neglect. The most regrettable part of the whole situation was that the principal perpetrators were a black principal and black athletic director who was also head football coach.
Wow, this system is horribly broken. But what's the significance of the harassers being black?
What are you talking about? Rachael never said the harassers were black!
Oh, I think you misread the phrase "back house labor." In restaurants, the kitchen is referred to as "the back." The dining area is the front.
It seems obvious to me that people who have experienced a long history of discrimination should be the least likely to discriminate themselves.
So, what do we do? We gotta do something, right?
*Sigh* the best thing we can do is not go after the corporation directly, they'll just dig in their heels, hide behind lawyers and stonewall. We need more government action for oversight and investigation. We need the agencies that protect us to be funded and supported..
So send this story to your Congressthing or Senator. Write a letter to the federal and state departments of labor. If the store is a franchise, Findi out who is the real owner and write to her or visit her house. Get involved in your local government to see that this kind of crap does not happen.
Boycotting is easy, doing something meaningful requires work. In the words of Thom Hartman
"Tag! You're it!"
-*Zortag*-
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