Justice Elizabeth H. Emerson
Employer Ice Systems moved for summary judgment dismissing Zutrau’s complaint. Jansing, Ice’s president, promised Zutrau an equity interest in 2001 if she worked with him to rehabilitate the company until it became profitable and could be sold. Zutrau agreed, received a 22 percent equity interest and was appointed Ice’s secretary and treasurer in 2004. Yet Jansing opposed Zutrau’s attempts to comply with the wage-and-hour laws, and terminated her employment shortly thereafter in 2007. Zutrau asserted claims individually and derivatively on behalf of Ice, including sex discrimination. Zutrau and Jansing engaged in a consensual relationship between 2001 and 2003. Jansing alleged the relationship ended in 2003, but Zutrau claimed it continued as a platonic relationship until 2007, which she ended and was terminated three weeks later. Contrary to Zutrau’s claims that she was discharged because she ended her relationship with Jansing and rebuffed his attempts to rekindle it, the court said that did not constitute quid pro-quo sexual harassment. Thus, defendants were entitled to dismissal of the claim for sex discrimination, but denied dismissal of the claims for disability discrimination and retaliatory discharge.
