Company supervisors, who often administered the spankings, testified in April that [Janet] Orlando was a willing participant in the team-building exercises and that she never complained about being spanked. They said she quit because she was passed over for a promotion.
An attorney representing the company likened the activities to old-fashioned fraternity hazing and said they were not meant to harm anyone.
But a jury sided with Orlando and awarded her $1.7 million — of which Orlando was to receive $800,000.
After Alarm One filed an appeal, Orlando agreed to settle the case for $1.4 million.
Except now, Orlando’s lawyer claims, the insurer has backed out of the settlement (the insurer refused to comment, so the press has only one side to report), so he’s seeking to leverage this alleged refusal to pay into a $5.6 million bad-faith award. As for Orlando herself, she blames a recent shoplifting arrest and no-contest plea (her third in three years) on stress from the dispute and newfound fame. Also left unexplained by the story: how it came to be that Orlando was to receive less than half of her award, with the majority going to her lawyer. (Chris Collins, “Award in spanking suit going unpaid”, Fresno Bee, Dec. 14).
One Comment
Spanking employees? Legal stuff aside, how did anyone in the company think this was a good idea?