The porn-on-the-job issue has hit the University of Nevada at Reno, where a university locksmith worker is suing three bosses for retaliating when he complained about a porn screensaver and nude calendars in his work area.
"I'm not a prude," said Charles Stricker Jr. to reporters about his sexual harassment and retaliation litigation against his former immediate supervisor Rick Favre, facilities supervisor George Leone, and UNR vice president of facilities Buzz Nelson.
"As a man, I'm drawn to that stuff, too, but I avoid it in my private life, and I don’t need it forced on me at work. It's inappropriate in the workplace, it's unethical, and it's illegal by state and federal law,” he said.
The Stricker suit began its court trial June 13. He charges that he complained about the screensaver and nude calendars and all were removed after his complaints, but he was treated differently by other workers after that. He also said his bosses told him if he didn't like the materials, he could find another job.
He sued Favre, Leone, and Nelson in May 2003. None of the three has commented about the suit.
UNR attorney Mark Ghan, defending the three, said there had been no retaliation against Stricker, that the screensaver he complained about actually wasn't pornographic and had been removed in 1999, and the calendars were locked up at the same time and removed from the campus in 2003.
“This is a small potatoes case in a lot of ways,” Ghan was quoted as saying. “But any case that goes to a federal jury trial is serious and we take it seriously.”
Stricker's attorney, Jeffrey A. Dickerson, said his client endured five years' harassment. “We’ll show that even though the supervisors said they removed the pornographic material, that really didn’t happen for some time,” he was quoted as telling the court. “By complaining about the porn he eventually took away his bosses’ toys and they were mad at him. So he was going to work and confronted with obstacles every day.”
