Massa Aide Opens Door to Lawsuit

A onetime aide to former Rep. Eric Massa has filed a complaint with the congressional Office of Compliance alleging that he and other staffers were subjected to various forms of sexual harassment by their boss, who resigned in March amid an ethics investigation into his behavior toward aides.
The filing, for the first time, raises the specter that Massa’s case could end up in the legal sphere.
Debra Katz, the attorney for the former aide, says a complaint alleges that Massa, a freshman Democrat from New York, “subjected my client and other young gay men” to “unwelcome touching, sexual propositions, groping, sexualized comments” and similar forms of harassment both inside his official congressional office and outside of it.
Katz declined to name the Office of Compliance as the recipient of the complaint – “We have filed a sexual harassment complaint with the correct office,” she said in an interview with POLITICO – but that is the office to which claims of employment discrimination against lawmakers must be submitted as a gateway to federal court.

Read more: (Jonathan Allen, “Massa Aide Opens Door to Lawsuit,” Politico, 04/13/10)