A former senior manager for Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers who sued the Marina del Rey-based company for nearly $80 million, alleging she was subjected to sexual harassment and fired in 2024, can have her claims decided by a jury rather than an arbitrator, a judge has ruled.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Colin Leis on Wednesday denied a defense motion to compel arbitration of Tanzanica King’s lawsuit against ICANN. The company is a private, non-government, nonprofit corporation with responsibility for Internet protocol address space allocation, protocol parameter assignment, domain name system management and root server system management functions.
In his ruling, the judge cited the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act, which allows individuals who have been the victim of sexual assault or harassment to choose to pursue their claims in court rather than being bound by a mandatory arbitration agreement like the one the defense maintained was binding on King.
“Plaintiff alleges that during her 22-year tenure at ICANN she was subjected to `frat boy’ culture, having been passed over for promotions, paid lower salaries than male colleagues, sexually harassed and then wrongfully terminated for `blowing the whistle,”’ the judge wrote.
Tanzanica King, 47, was a senior manager for meeting strategy and design. King’s allegations include wrongful termination, gender violence, sexual harassment, retaliation, harassment, intentional infliction of emotional distress, defamation and violations of the state Labor Code. She seeks more than $77 million in damages.
“For all its poetic waxing of gender equality, ICANN is a rotted apple veiled by a thin shiny veneer,” the suit brought last Aug. 13 states.
ICANN previously issued a statement regarding King’s claims.
“We are disappointed that a former employee is making numerous false allegations and painting a distorted picture of our organization,” the statement said. “ICANN fosters a positive, safe and inclusive environment, which is enforced through a zero-tolerance policy toward harassment, discrimination and retaliation of any kind.
“If someone breaks rules meant to keep our staff and community safe, we take swift and decisive action. The ICANN board conducted a thorough independent investigation of this matter, and we will defend our organization and our policies vigorously.”
ICANN’s website states that the company’s “work culture energizes all of us. It’s not something we simply write and talk about; it is something we feel, creating and sustaining a positive work culture is a critical part of our success,” the suit notes.
But in reality, ICANN’s policymakers and board members “have knowingly continued to treat its female employees as second-class citizens” and subject women to a culture that pays women less than men and also subjects female employees to an “enveloping culture of rampant harassment which is routinely ignored,” the suit alleges.
Although females report widespread pay and promotion discrimination and sexual harassment to ICANN every year via surveys, studies, reports to superiors and to human resources, nothing changes, the suit alleges.
At 22 years of service, King was ICANN’s second-longest tenured employee, but in exchange for her dedication, she was repeatedly passed over for promotions, paid lower salaries than male colleagues, sexually harassed and wrongfully terminated, the suit states.
During an ICANN conference in Denmark in 2017, King’s supervisor sat next to her and tried to hold one of her hands and groped her legs under a table, according to the suit, which further alleges the boss repeatedly tried to grab her hand when they walked along hallways and streets and also complimented the plaintiff on her breast size.
The supervisor was fired in February 2023 for his conduct toward King, according to the suit, which further states that many women who work for ICANN have shared that sexual harassment is “endemic” to the company.
In 2014, King discovered that ICANN paid, at minimum, many lower-positioned men significantly higher salaries than it paid the plaintiff, according to the complaint. One ICANN employee with knowledge of the firm’s inner workings told King that she would be better off at another company, the suit states.
King went on unpaid medical leave in December 2023 to deal with the stress she suffered from the retaliation and harassment that came after she complained about her work environment, according to her suit, which further states that she was fired in May 2024 by managers who told her the move was a cost-cutting measure, even though King was not being paid at the time and several employees had to handle the workload she previously did by herself.