This is true Moreluck. I personally know of a couple of cases that UPS settled on just to get them out of the way. There weren't sexual harassment cases, but the company mentality is the same. The cost and time of litigation (keeping the company lawyers tied up) creates out of court settlements.
The fact that there were settlements don't anymore prove guilt than it does innocence.
I have been unable to chime in because I have been closing out my California house FINALLY. This thread moves faster than any in recent history that I have read!
1. I personally apologized to wkmac for jumping to conclusions about ignoring a request. As this story has unfolded, many have jumped to conclusions without any proof. Based on unsubstantiated accusations from people who have waited 15 to 20 years to come forward.
Ask yourself what would you do if someone sexually harrassed you?
Have you been on both sides of the fence? (Harrassed and a harrassor [sp check])
You might react differently if you were a harrassor... OR provoked that reaction in someone by flirting etc.)
How are you going to prove that you are telling the truth?
How can an investigator prove who is lying or telling the truth? Is there video? Is there a child? Is there any physical evidence? Is there a confession? If the answers are no, all the rest is hear-say.
This leads me into a personal story as an accused manager at UPS. I have to preface this with this statement. I have been faithful to my wife since the day I met her 41 years ago. 1991 - The term sexual harrassment was just starting to poke it's head into the workplace. There were no guideline how to handle cases that came up. I was one of the first to be accused in this new frontier! I was building a case against a female driver who had high claims and extremely poor DR methods. Next thing I know my division manager told me about the accusation. He also told me that I was going to have to be interviewed by HR at the district office. My reaction as an innocent person was this. "What time do you want me and my wife there?" He had a puzzled look on his face. I further explained in a pissed off tone "If you are going to accuse me of something I did not do then you will tell it directly to my wife's face because I WILL NOT go home and tell her what happened in this meeting. So what time do you want us there? My division manager backed off and said I will get back to you. No meeting ever happened. But HR came to the center and interviewed at lenght every female employee and interviewed others as well to try and substantiate a pattern of behavior. My division manager started testing me by commenting on some of the women clerks in a very provacative manner to see how I reacted.
To make a long story short, they could not find any pattern of even minor flirting. The person accusing me, seeing that nothing was happening, started making the story worse and accusing me of running my hand up her thigh and grabbing her in the crotch. I know that all of this was false BUT I could not prove it. My best vindication was that I remained the center manager in this center for another 3 years! After this incident, I did not trust anyone. Everytime I met with any women there was a supervisor or shop steward present PERIOD. I kept building a case on this driver but in a non-vindictive way. She won also, she did not see any further discipline but she did start using good DR methods!
I have no idea what kind of rumors were floating around during that time.
We formulate the way we think and act based on our life experiences and the personality traits we are born with. Because of this personal incident, I look at things differently and give people the benefit of the doubt.
