According to a lawsuit filed earlier this month, Fidelity Investments has a “locker room” culture, where a former employee faced an “unrelenting hostile work environment” at the company’s campus in Merrimack, New Hampshire.
Elizabeth Evans claims she was taunted by two male colleagues who openly made offensive remarks about her pregnancy, race, women’s bodies and slavery. “I’m fighting for my career in an industry that wasn’t made for people that look like me,” said Evans, who is described in the lawsuit as Afro-Latina and of Dominican descent.
A spokesman for Fidelity, Vincent Loporchio, said the firm “investigated her complaints and found that they were without merit. We take all allegations of inappropriate behavior very seriously and when behavior of this sort is brought to our attention we investigate it and take prompt and appropriate action. We have no tolerance for this type of behavior and never will,” according to Bloomberg.
But Evans doesn’t see it that way. The 37 year old left the firm in 2018, but while there, she says she experienced a barrage of racial and sexual antagonism.
In 2016, Evans became pregnant, and, according to the suit, a male colleague in close proximity spoke in “graphic detail” about what happens to a woman’s body after childbirth. Additionally, they they allegedly asked if she planned to stay home with her children “like every other mom who says she’s coming back to work” and referred to maternity leave as “vacation.”
According to the suit, that was just part of the problem, which extended to racial insensitivity as well. That employee and Evans’s male supervisor allegedly made a variety of other offensive comments, including calling Hitler a good leader and suggesting slavery was great for the economy.
The two colleagues are named as defendants in the lawsuit and remain employees of Fidelity.
Evans felt she was ignored by her supervisor and others, in what she saw as retaliation for her complaints. “I never would have seen myself in this position,” Evans said about filing the lawsuit. “I have to laugh because it feels surreal.”
The case is Evans v. Fidelity Service Co., 216-2020-CV-00852, Hillsborough Superior Court, New Hampshire.
