North America

The Rhode Island Fair Housing Practices Act prohibits housing practices that discriminate based on gender identity or expression, which is defined to include a person’s actual or perceived gender, as well as a person’s gender identity, gender-related self-image, gender-related appearance, or gender-related expression; whether or not that gender identity, gender-related self-image, gender-related appearance, or gender-related expression is different from that traditionally associated with the person's sex at birth.

Here, the defendant employer appealed the Board’s decision that the plaintiff had good cause to walk away from her employment as she was sexually harassed and her employer failed to rectify the situation. The son of the defendant-business owner and the defendant’s manager sexually harassed the plaintiff in a verbal and physical nature. The plaintiff tried to discuss the situation with the business owner but the harassment continued. Further, she was advised by the owner that all managerial responsibilities were given to his son and that the plaintiff would have to work it out with the son.

Employee filed suit against her employer, the University of Tennessee, alleging sex discrimination under the Equal Pay Act and the Tennessee Human Rights Act (“THRA”).  She also alleged that her employer retaliated against her for filing an EEOC charge.  The Court of Appeals held that there was sufficient evidence to support the verdict that she had suffered discrimination and that her employer retaliated against her.  Plaintiff was an employee of the University’s Agricultural Extension Service since 1980.  She was eligible for a promotion in 1986, but was not promoted.&

Appellant-employer filed an appeal from a decision of the Court of Appeals, which reversed a ruling entered in the Superior Court, granting appellant’s motion for partial summary judgment and dismissing appellee-employee’s wrongful discharge claim. The Supreme Court of Washington affirmed the appellate court’s decision, holding that appellee properly stated a cause of action for the tort of wrongful discharge based on the clearly articulated public policy against sex discrimination in employment.

The plaintiff sued her former employer, alleging wrongful termination because she refused her supervisor’s request for unmarried sex in violation of a statute that proscribed fornication. The plaintiff alleged that her supervisor also made frequent lewd requests and comments when he was alone with her as well as suggestive gestures and inquiries concerning her romantic life.

Plaintiffs Kami and Angie Roe sued the Executive Director of the Utah Department of Health in his official capacity and sought a preliminary injunction seeking a court order to enjoin the defendants from applying sections of the Utah Uniform Parentage Act differently to male and female spouses of women who become pregnant via sperm donation.

In Roe v. Planned Parenthood Southwest Ohio Region, 122 Ohio St.3d 399 (2009), the parents of a minor who had obtained an abortion sued Planned Parenthood, alleging that the procedure was performed illegally without the required parental notification. During discovery, the plaintiffs sought medical records and abuse reports concerning other minors who had received abortions at the clinic over the previous ten years. Planned Parenthood refused to produce those records, citing physician–patient privilege.

In 1973, the U.S. Supreme Court decided Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, after a Texas woman challenged a state law that banned nearly all abortions except when necessary to save the mother’s life.

Joliffe was granted a temporary ex parte protective order against Roper, with whom she aws in a relationship, following an incident of violence at Roper’s apartment, with a hearing on the matter of the protective order scheduled eight days later. Roper motioned for limited discovery and a jury trial. The jury trial was denied but the limited discovery was granted. The court granted Jolliffe a two year protective order, finding by a preponderance of the evidence that Roper was a threat, and ordered Roper to participate in the Batterer’s Intervention and Counselling Program (BIPP).

Pro se plaintiff Rosati, a transgender female, was imprisoned in California and suffering from Gender Dysphoria. Prison officials refused to provide the medically necessary gender reassignment surgery. The prison officials denied the gender reassignment surgery on the recommendation of a physician’s assistant who had no experience in transgender medicine and in spite of the plaintiff attempting repeated self-castrations. The district court dismissed without leave to amend for failure to state a claim on which relief could be granted.