Chipotle to pay more than $7 million in sexual harassment lawsuit

HOUSTON — A jury awarded $7.65 million plus legal fees to a Texas woman on Monday, and Chipotle will have to pay the bill.

In a lawsuit filed in 2014, the woman said she was sexually harassed by two managers at a Chipotle restaurant that she worked at in Houston for four months.

"We feel an employer has an obligation to provide a safe working environment, especially when the employer knows the employee is a minor," attorney Adrian Villacorta said in February.

According to WDAF-TV, the assistant manager, Gerardo Solis, started touching the woman inappropriately in the workspace weeks after she was hired.

The lawsuit claimed Solis initially said the touching was accidental, but he later began regularly touching her and "grooming" her for sex at the Chipotle restaurant. By the summer of 2014, Solis was having unprotected sex with the victim "at the restaurant dumpster, in the restroom, in the office and other places," the lawsuit stated.

"In a matter of six weeks, her supervisor was bumping into her breasts, commenting about her breasts," said attorney Ben Hall. "Other supervisors were using cameras to look at the butts and breasts of women at that restaurant."

The lawsuit described a work environment in which managers "would have sex, kiss, hug, sexually touch and pursue intimate relationships."

"It's almost like a brothel that just served food. That's the best way to characterize this restaurant," Hall said.

Villacorta said the restaurant's then-general manager was aware of the activity and did nothing to stop it.

According to WDAF, the victim's mother said that on one occassion, she went to the Chipotle to pick up her daughter from work and found that she and Solis were not at the restaurant. The mother said the general manager "begged" her not to call police.

"The evidence showed that one of the supervisors had more than 50 (incidents of) unprotected sexual intercourse with this child and oral sex," Hall said.

The victim eventually quit her job because of the abuse, KPRC-TV reported.

"It was definitely hard. I never expected it to be like that," the victim told KPRC. "I just went there to work and earn some money, and I never expected that from managers to treat women like they're not supposed to be treated."

"The fact of the matter is that these sexual assaults were being committed by managers," said Villacorta. "These aren't low-level crew members. These are managers, agents of the corporation. So the jury grasped on to that concept that the manager, who was committing sexual assaults, and an upper level manager, who helped facilitate the assaults, were Chipotle. What they knew, Chipotle knew."

"Chipotle's conduct in this case was outrageous," said Hall. "Chipotle wanted to couch it as a relationship, but the jury was clear you cannot have a sexual relationship with a 16-year-old child. That's why they call it a sexual assault."

Chipotle released a statement, saying, "We care deeply about all of our employees, but even our rigorous policies specifically designed to protect our employees cannot prevent private relationships that happen away from the workplace during non-work hours, such as occurred in this case."

It continued: "We continue to offer our support for this former employee, and hope for her well-being. Chipotle goes to great lengths to provide safe and productive work environments. We have internal policies, procedures, and training to address issues and potential problems between employees, if ever they arise. None of our employees were made aware of this relationship, which took place outside of work. We learned of it only when the former employee's parents demanded money and filed a lawsuit, and by that time, neither of the employees worked for the company any longer."

She also said the legal victory is "going to help other people to not be scared to speak out."

Solis is believed to have fled to Mexico to avoid criminal prosecution, WDAF reported.

Cox Media Group