Ken Sexually Harrased With Barbie
Only two weeks after he lost his VCAT case for compensation from the AFL over his sacking as a trainer from Bonnie Doon football club, former firefighter, sporting trainer and bisexual Ken Campagnolo has lost a second case, a sexual harassment suit that he brought against the Victorian government. However there is still a chance that that he could win the discrimination claim that he has also filed.
42 year-old Campagnolo was unable to convince the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) that he had lost his job at the Department of Sustainability and Environment (DSE) because of his bisexuality, nor could he prove that he’d been sexually harassed.
Mr Campagnolo blames publicity over his spat with the DSE for the loss of his work at Bonnie Doon. Campagnolo told VCAT that his boss and other employees repeatedly bullied him in a slanderous and sexual way. According to Campagnolo, as he was leaving a pub in Mansfield, his boss Chris Purcell told him “You can fight the fires for free, but you’ll never get a job with DSE because you’re a poof.”
Mr Campognolo claims that his DSE boss and fellow workmates turned the rest of the staff against him, making it impossible for him to gain employment as a project fire fighter.
Mr Campagnolo said he was called a “poof” repeatedly and was even publicly outed as bisexual at a staff Christmas party when he was presented with a Barbie doll. The pranks didn’t end there, with dolls left on his locker to taunt him about his sexual orientation.
He also blamed the public nature of his spat with the DSE for losing his volunteer training position at the Bonnie Doon Football club.
However, his accused workmates at the DSE have thoroughly denied his claims, calling them “fanciful” and iterating that Mr Campagnolo was not employed “because he failed to meet the standards of fire fighting competence required”.
In regards to the doll incidents, the DSE said that was a friendly play on his name Ken, and not anything derogatory.
The VCAT judge Marylin Harbison said Mr Campagnolo should have received better legal advice and not just represented himself, before striking out his claim of sexual harassment but adjourning his discrimination case so it could be further assessed.
“Mr Purcell’s words may well be described as abusive and offensive, but they cannot as a matter of law be described as sexual harassment because they do not represent an unwelcome sexual advance,” Judge Harbison said.
“Clearly, many of the instances relied upon by the complainant are instances of unwelcome conduct… that unwelcome conduct, if proven to have occurred, occurred in circumstances in which a reasonable person would have anticipated that the complainant would be offended, humiliated or intimidated.
“This case shows the need for complainants to have legal advice available to them… lack of access to legal advice should not mean that a case which might otherwise be arguable should be struck out.”
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kaypea2007
said on the 8th Oct, 2008