California

In 1987, Fatmeh Badih (“Badih”), a recent immigrant from Sierra Leone, was hired by the medical offices of Dr. Leonard Myers (“Myers”) as a medical assistant. Almost three years later, Badih told Myers she was pregnant. He immediately fired her. According to Badih, when she told Myers the news he replied, “If you told me you were going to get married and have babies, I wouldn’t have hired you in the first place. I need an office girl when I need her, not a person that has responsibilities the way you do now. . . .

Plaintiff Gonzales was a full-time accountant for the Los Angeles Airport Marriott when she arranged to be a gestational surrogate, due to give birth in April 2014. When the child was born, Plaintiff used her three work breaks to pump breast milk and send it to the child’s family. After two weeks of shipping the milk to the family, Plaintiff continued to lactate for personal health reasons and donated the milk to women’s organizations for mothers who could not breastfeed. Marriot then discontinued her two extra breaks arguing that she was not disabled and not feeding a child at home.

Maria Elena Gonzalez (“Gonzalez”) filed for a temporary restraining order against her former partner, Maurelio Francisco Munoz (“Munoz”). She complained that Munoz violently attacked her on numerous occasions including burning her with hot grease, choking and beating her, and abusing her three-year-old daughter Flor. The trial court granted a temporary ex-parte restraining order to keep Munoz from Gonzalez and Flor. The court also issued personal conduct and stay-away orders, and granted physical and legal custody of Flor to Gonzalez with no visitation rights for Munoz.

Plaintiff worked as a research specialist under her supervisor, Dennis Montgomery (“Montgomery”). On several occasions during her employment Montgomery asked Plaintiff to perform oral sex on him. He also repeatedly told Plaintiff he was going to arrive at one of Plaintiff’s many jobsites to engage in sexual activity with her. Twice Montgomery masturbated in front of Plaintiff during work hours. During one of those times, Plaintiff ran from the office to her car and Montgomery followed her, grabbed her arm, tried to grab her breasts, and tried to stop her from entering her car.

Defendant shot and killed her partner, Albert Hampton (“Hampton”), in their home in Fresno, California. When a police officer arrived she immediately surrendered, told him where the gun was, and admitted that she shot him. She explained, “He deserved it. I just couldn’t take it anymore. I told him to stop beating on me.” Defendant was charged with murder with personal use of a firearm. At trial, the defense asserted that Defendant shot Hampton in self-defense. They presented expert testimony on battered women’s syndrome from Dr.

Plaintiffs were women’s basketball players for Pepperdine University, a university receiving state funding from California. Plaintiffs allege that when the basketball coach became aware of their lesbian relationship, they were harassed and forced by the athletic coordinator to end their relationship or quit the team. Defendant motioned to dismiss, citing Plaintiff’s failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted.