- Yanowitz v. L’Oreal (2004)
DREDF signed on to an amicus brief to the California Supreme Court in the Yanowitz v. L’Oreal case. We were joined by a number of other California civil rights and legal services offices in arguing for an expansive construction of the “retaliation” protection under California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA). Yanowitz is a gender discrimination case in which the female plaintiff, a mid-level manager at the L’Oreal cosmetic company, alleged she was fired for defying a senior manager’s order to fire a subordinate for what she believed was a discriminatory (sexist) reason. In August 2005, the California Supreme Court endorsed an expansive interpretation of FEHA deciding that California workplace sexual harassment/hostile environment prohibitions protect a middle-manager who was retaliated against when she refused to carry out an order from a male supervisor to fire another employee because she wasn’t “hot” enough.
