In Frey v. Northern Soy, Inc. et al, Case # 23-CV-6198-FPG, 2024 WL 4373767 (W.D.N.Y. Oct. 2, 2024), the court, inter alia, denied defendants’ motion to dismiss plaintiff’s sex-based hostile work environment claim.
From the decision:
Defendants also contend that Plaintiff has failed to state a claim for hostile work environment.3 See ECF No. 10-1 at 17-18. Although Defendant do not dispute that Holland’s alleged conduct could be found to be severe and/or pervasive, they assert that Plaintiff has failed to “establish the necessary causal link between the alleged offensive conduct and her gender.” Id. at 18. The Court is not persuaded. Holland frequently made statements about women to Plaintiff and her female coworkers, including statements related to their physical attributes, appearance, and weight. See ECF No. 1 ¶¶ 29-32. In conjunction with Holland’s frequent comments about his “love[ ]” for lesbians, one can reasonably infer that these comments had sexual overtones. Id. ¶ 32. Likewise, because these comments were directed only at the female employees of the office, cf. id. ¶ 33, it is reasonable to infer that Holland acted in this manner towards Plaintiff because she was a woman. Cf. Cruz v. N.Y.S. Dep’t of Corrs. & Cmty. Supervision, No. 13-CV-1335, 2014 WL 2547541, at *4 (S.D.N.Y. June 4, 2014) (“If a supervisor engages in gender-specific harassment, such as expressing an implied sexual desire based on an employee’s ‘V-shape’ back, it is plausible that a jury can infer that that stated desire was because of the employee’s sex, and the Court cannot properly rule as a matter of law that that gender-specific harassment was not because of the employee’s sex.” (internal quotation marks, brackets, citation, and ellipsis omitted)).
Accordingly, the court concluded that dismissal on the ground was not warranted.