Blacklisting - Sexual Harassment - Retaliation

[Anonymous <no_email@fake.address>]

I began working for Creative Solutions approximately 1 year ago.  Initially from the beginning someone who was not my friend or a designated reference had called the company attempting to blacklist me by spreading slanderous information about me that is not true. (I believe it was an ex-boyfriend that had called.) Part of the information included painting me as a promiscuous nymphomaniac who had had a pretty wild youth with lots of boyfriends.  Instead of management dismissing this, they allowed the rumors to circulate about me in the company even though the content of the rumors was of a sexual nature.  This led to me being mis-perceived as an employee.  The men seemed to think that since I was  promiscuous I would be an easy target to sexually harass and the women saw me as a bimbo that also might be a threat since they thought I might be the type of woman willing to sleep with someone in management to get ahead.  (I later found out there was a history of this at this company.)

I started being subjected to constant comments from the men about my breasts and looks and the women tried to make it difficult for me to do my job.  The situation worsened as the harassment also started to consist of being told to my face and in passing that I had already been fired.  They were trying to treat me as if I was already no longer being treated seriously as an employee there and it was a matter of time before they were to let me go, all based upon these rumors and nothing to do with how I was handling my job professionally.  

I complained to Human Resources during the second month that I was there about some of the inappropriate remarks that the men were making towards me.  Their Sexual Harassment policy consists of the statement that they "will investigate any allegations of sexual harassement."  They said they would investigate my allegations.  During the follow up meeting, I was told that they had investigated my allegations but that the allegations were found to be unsubstantiated.  Additionally, I was told that if I continued to make unsubstantiated allegations that it would be grounds for dismissal.

The hostile work environment became worse.  The company decided to retaliate against me for complaining about sexual harassment.  Part of this included attempts to sabotage my ability to do a good job.  As I do technical support for software over the phone, the other co-workers would stand near me while I was on the phone with customers and harass and laugh at me.  Additionally, on the more difficult calls, if I needed assistance from a senior resource to resolve the problem, more often than not, they would purposefully give me wrong information, even though I would be troubleshooting a call for a custmer.  Some of the other reps as well would place fake calls into the line I was answering and be abusive to me on the phone. All this was done with the knowledge and approval of the supervisors in the department. The situation became worse, as the other employees discovered that even though I was not being helped in learning my job, that I was still becoming very good at quickly solving troubleshooting calls and solving some of the more difficult calls faster than some of the other reps that had been there longer.

I also started to be harassed by a male co-worker who was a senior resource who decided that he would give me the opportunity to sleep with him if I wanted to get ahead in the company.  He would often times come over to my desk and be inappropriately way too flirtatious, try and stand too close to me and he even tried to kiss me one time when I was asking him a question about how to handle a situation with a customer.  (I had to dodge him so that he couldn't kiss me.)  The situation has only gotten worse with this individual, as he has been promoted to being my manager.  He is now doing everything in his power to try and get rid of me since I did not take him up on his offer to sleep with him to keep my job.  I am constantly subjected to inappropriate comments from him about my body and other harassing comments, for example he told me "he thought I was shaped like a slut".  The other managers see this going on and do nothing about it, because it is their attitude that being able to sleep with female co-workers of your choice is one of the perks of being having power and being in management. 

This manager has also started to try to portray me as being unqualified to do my job to others in the company in an attempt to get rid of me. The situation has gotten worse, as they have recently hired a large number of new people in this department (since this all began, there has been substantial turnover in the department and a lot of the women especially, have left and found other jobs.).  The new workers are being told right from the git go slander about me, so that I won't be taken seriously as a professional by the new co-workers.  The attitude management portrays is - go along with this if you want to keep your new job.

Currently, I am doing legal research and looking for a good lawyer to take my case against this company.  If anyone has any suggestions on how I might proceed with dealing with this legally, any suggestions would be welcome.  Please email me at mswnsn@hotmail.com.