Extension of Anti-Retaliation Protection under Title VII
In Crawford v. Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County, Tennessee, U.S. No. 06-1595, the United States Supreme Court has extended the anti-retaliation protection of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act to employees who answer questions in an investigation conducted by the employer based on another employee’s complaint of discrimination. Ms. Crawford was interviewed by an agent of the employer about an allegation of sexual harassment perpetrated against another employee by the employer’s Director of Employee Relations.
When Ms. Crawford was intereviewed by an employee of the HR department who was handing the investigation, she alleged that she, also, had been a victim of the Director of Employee Relations’ sexually harassing activity. Ms. Crawford never filed any sort of complaint against the Director of Employee Relations at the time that she alleged that he harassed her, and she never told her employer about it.
A few months after the investigation, Ms. Crawford and two other employees (both of whom had reported that they, too, were victim’s of sexual harassment at the hands of the Director of Employee Relations) were fired for reasons which were purportedly not related to their revelations during the investigation.
Both the federal trial court and the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals denied Crawford relief under Title VII after concluding that Crawford did not engage in any protected activity, because she had not opposed any unlawful conduct or participated in an investigation pursuant to the initiation of an EEOC charge. The Supreme Court of the United States reversed, finding that Ms. Crawford’s statements were “in opposition” of presumed sexual harassment in the workplace and someone who is in “opposition” need not have previously initiated any claim of discrimination against the employer.
The decision in the Crawford case creates a low threshold for employees who claim they were retaliated against for reporting alleged discrimination. It matters not whether the employee responds to questions in an already pending internal investigation initiated by someone else, but rather even passive internal complaints of discrimination are sufficient for protection from retaliation under Title VII.