Calif. woman spanked by employers sues for $1.2 million

By Trevor Schubert

Published on April 28, 2006

Janet Orlando, 53, is suing Alarm One Inc., an Anaheim based company with 300 employees, on the grounds of discrimination, assault, battery, and infliction of emotional distress.

Employees for the securities firm were paddled with rival companies' yard signs, pelted with pies, forced to eat baby food and wear diapers, according to court documents; all in an attempt to build competition and camaraderie between inter-office sales teams.

"No reasonable middle-aged woman would want to be put up there before a group of young men, turned around to show her buttocks, get spanked and called abusive names, and told it was to increase sales and motivate employees," her lawyer, Nicholas "Butch" Wagner, said in his closing argument.

Lawyers for Alarm One said the spankings were not discriminatory because the hazing was given to both men and women and was, according to the defense, a voluntary program to build camaraderie.

"This is being done for one reason and one reason only -- money," said K. Poncho Baker, the attorney for Alarm One.

The spanking was halted by Alarm One in 2004, the year Orlando sued, but only after another employee claimed to have been injured, according to court records.

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