China News Agency, Beijing, March 1 (Reporter Zhang Su) The issue of sexual harassment in the workplace has attracted widespread attention.
The Supreme People's Court of China released typical civil cases such as the "Wang Mou v. Fu Mou Mou Sexual Harassment Liability Dispute Case" on March 1, and through the case, it was clarified that suffering sexual harassment in the workplace has the right to claim compensation for mental damage according to law.
The facts of the case showed that in order to pursue his colleague Wang, Fu kept calling and sending text messages with vulgar content and obscene language.
Since then, Wang was diagnosed with a depressive episode with psychotic symptoms by the hospital, so he sued the people's court and asked Fu to make a written apology to him and compensate him for mental damage and medical expenses.
The trial court held that Fu's frequent sexual harassment of Wang violated Wang's personality rights and caused great mental burden and physical harm to Wang, "should bear the corresponding legal responsibility according to law", so Fu X compensated Wang for mental damage of 30,000 yuan (RMB, the same below) and 61,804.2 yuan for medical expenses, and apologized in writing to Wang.
The Supreme Court believes that the judgment of this case is conducive to giving play to the role of judicial judgment in regulating and guiding social behavior.
The reporter combed and found that the Third People's Court of Dongguan City, Guangdong Province had released data. From 2019 to 2021, the court accepted as many as 30 cases of sexual assault in the workplace.
In addition, the People's Court of Dongcheng District, Beijing once conducted research and found that there are few cases where employees sue for sexual harassment through legal means, and a high proportion of employees lose lawsuits due to insufficient evidence.
Some scholars pointed out that on the basis of existing legal norms, the Civil Code further clarifies the normative meaning of sexual harassment, establishes the basis for private law claims for sexual harassment damages, and clearly stipulates private law responsibilities of employers for sexual harassment damages.
In fact, since the implementation of the Civil Code, courts in Shanghai, Chongqing, Ningxia and other places have successively concluded disputes over liability for sexual harassment damages.
The Supreme Law will also issue guiding cases in 2022 for the protection of the legal rights and interests of workers, among which, after the implementation of the Civil Code, employers should reasonably build a sexual harassment prevention and handling mechanism, and effectively prevent sexual harassment in the workplace.
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