Ex-Faraday Future Employee Claims Startup Dismissed Sexual Harrassment Allegations

A security guard who previously worked at Faraday Future claims she was sexually harassed by an IT administrator and that the company dismissed her multiple complaints.

In a lawsuit, plaintiff Genesis Reyes alleges that Josue Alejandro Sanchez repeatedly approached her during work hours and asked for her personal information. At the time, Reyes says she was working in a single person security booth at the startup’s Californian headquarters.

Reyes further claims that Sanchez often “stared at [her] in a sexual way” and once followed her to the bathroom and waited outside the door for her. Following Reyes’ denial to provide her personal information to Sanchez, the defendant reportedly stole her work schedule and was able to find her phone number, repeatedly sending her text messages until she blocked his number, The Verge reports.

Reyes says that she brought verbal and written complaints to both Faraday Future and her employer G4S Secure Solutions. However, a supervisor at Faraday Future allegedly told her that “Sanchez simply had a ‘crush’” on her and that she was “inviting the harassment.” Shortly after issuing these complaints, Reyes was given a written warning in April 2017 and fired in May 2017.

In an email to The Verge, the lawyer for Reyes, James Urbanic, said the ex-employee wants to expose how Faraday Future and G4S operate.

“What kind of message does a company send when it fires a woman who has mustered up the courage to complain? The time has come to expose common corporate policies of “zero tolerance” as empty promises,” Urbanic said.

Responding to the lawsuit, Faraday Future simply said “We will not comment on ongoing litigation.”