(The following story by Paul Hammel appeared on the Omaha World-Herald website on April 2, 2010.)
LINCOLN, Neb. A legal complaint about employees who "goosed" co-workers' rear ends and called female colleagues "Rail Dogs" who bore their babies was derailed by the Nebraska Supreme Court on Friday.
The court ruled that the Union Pacific Railroad was not negligent in an alleged case of sexual harassment brought by a railroad worker out of Utah.
The worker who brought the complaint, Chadly S. Ballard, failed to prove that the UP knew or should have known that a trio of workers had "dangerous propensities," the ruling stated.
Ballard had filed suit after an incident involving a trio of co-workers on a UP crew in Delta, Utah. He said that two workers picked him up by the arms, and a third thrust his hips into Ballard's groin area.
The employees were suspended from work by the railroad due to the incident.
But lawsuits filed by Ballard in both federal and state court were dismissed.
Under a federal employers law that pertains to railroads, a person must prove that a co-worker had a propensity for harmful, harassing behavior and that his employer was aware of it.
