Google at Tokyo Pride, 2018. (NurPhoto via Getty/ Alessandro Di Ciommo)
A Black, gay Google security guard has filed a lawsuit alleging that he was physically and emotionally harassed for years at the tech giant’s Los Angeles offices.
David Brown is jointly employed by security company Allied Universal, and Google’s parent company Alphabet Inc, according to Reuters.
In his lawsuit, filed in a Los Angeles state court, Brown claimed the harassment based on his sexual orientation and race took place over six years, between 2014 and 2020.
He alleged that the majority of the harassment was at the hands of his supervisor, Henry Linares.
Linares was an account manager at Allied Universal, who handled Google’s security.
Brown alleged that Linares’ behaviour included “grabbing him on the buttocks, kicking him in the groin, throwing him through a window head first and brutally grabbing his nipples”.
Linares was fired this year, for reasons unrelated to Brown’s allegations.
The lawsuit also alleged that Rus Rossini, who is senior manager for global community operations at Google, was involved in the harassment of the gay security guard.
He “participated in the discrimination and sexual harassment and took no corrective action”, the lawsuit states.
According to the court filing and screenshots reviewed by Reuters, in a message to Linares, Rossini joked that there should be “strip searches for all” after some items went missing at the offices.
Linares said Brown would “love that”, to which Rossini responded: “Tell David to bend over.”
According to Brown’s attorney, V James DeSimone, his client “turned those screenshots to human resources, implicating Rossini in the harassment”, yet Rossini did not address it.
PinkNews has approached Google for comment.
Google recently settled with a queer former employee who claimed they were fired over activism
In 2019, three LGBT+ workers who were fired by Google during Thanksgiving week alleged that they were dismissed by the tech giant because of their employee activism.
Laurence Berland, Sophie Waldman and Rebecca Rivers, who all identify as LGBT+, were fired duing the same week, along with another employee, Paul Duke, who is not LGBT+.
While Google said they lost their jobs because of “violations of data security policies”, the former Googlers said they were sacked to send a message to stop workers organising and employee activism.
In July, 2021, Google reached a settlement with Berland, although the terms have not been disclosed.