A judge in Minnesota has ruled that a national check-printing company must pay $115,000 and apologize to a transgender “woman” for banning “her” from using the women’s restroom. Minnesota-based Deluxe Financial Services, Inc. has been asked to pay $115,000 to the complainant, Britney Austin, and also to change its policies for transgender employees, as part of the settlement of a sex discrimination and harassment lawsuit brought by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
Austin, employed in the company’s Phoenix offices, told her supervisor in 2011 that she is a transgender and began to present herself as a woman at work. Deluxe refused to let her use the women’s restroom, according to the complaint, which states that supervisors and coworkers subjected Austin to a “hostile work environment, including hurtful epithets and intentionally using the wrong gender pronouns to refer to her.” FULL REPORT
