Gwen Schwartz wants to be heard, even if it takes a $3 million lawsuit.
Claiming that U of T and the University Health Network (UHN) have failed to address her complaint of sexual harassment, she’s turned to the courts to try to make them accountable.
“I believe this is a culmination of exhausting every avenue that this institution has available,” said Schwartz, a 36-year old PhD candidate who has been working as a medical researcher at the UHN, the network of research hospitals affiliated with U of T. “I’m exhausted; it’s been an entirely horrendous experience all the way through.”
Schwartz alleges in her statement of claim, filed in December, that Fehlings, a professor in the Faculty of Medicine and a UHN employee, “neglected his professional duties and responsibilities toward the plaintiff in favour of his own sexual gratification” and that he engaged in “abuse of power, assault.”
Fehling’s lawyer, Jonathan Lisus, denied the allegations. “They’re false and they’re going to be very rigorously defended.”
Besides Fehlings, Dr. David Naylor, the Dean of Medicine, and the Governing Council of U of T are named as defendants in Schwartz’s suit.
UHN president Tom Closson and Emma Pavlov, the UHN’s vice president of human resources, are also named, along with Schwartz’s former lawyers and her union.
Schwartz claims that U of T and the UHN and their employees “were prepared to accept any manner of conduct destructive to the lives and livelihoods of [Schwartz]…for the sake of preserving the research funding and prestige brought to their own work and to the defendants U of T and UHN by the defendant Fehlings.”
Angela Hildyard, Vice President of Human Resources and Equity at U of T, believes that the university has offered Schwartz nothing but support.
“The university is confident that it has responded appropriately and responsibly in addressing Ms. Schwartz’s complaints,” Hildyard wrote in a memo addressed to The Varsity. She says that U of T has provided Schwartz with “multi-year financial assistance” and academic support that included appointing her a new graduate supervisor.
In her statement of claim, Schwartz alleges that U of T “fostered and condoned the development of a toxic academic environment” that was hostile to her.
Naylor, she alleges, engaged in “abuse of power” and “abuse of process” and that he “acted in a manner so as to enable sexual harassment,” says the statement of claim.
The statement says further that he “interfered with the data-retrieval process” when Schwartz was trying to recover her work from Fehlings, pointing out “that the defendant Fehlings had contributed 20 years of work,” to Schwartz’s seven years.
Pavlov, according to the statement, made similar comments, such as “Michael’s behaviour was bad, but it is not as though he has killed anyone.”
Naylor declined The Varsity’s request for an interview.
Gillian Howard, a UHN spokesperson, also declined to comment, citing a letter received earlier by The Varsity as their final statement.
“UHN is committed to a workplace within which no one suffers harassment of any kind,” the letter, obtained during The Varsity’s initial investigation of Schwartz’s allegations, states. “To that end, policies and procedures are in place and are reviewed regularly to foster an environment of respect in the workplace.”
A formal complaint was filed with the UHN by Schwartz in March of 2003.
During the complaint process, Schwartz says she was faced with reassignment to a new supervisor with “interests completely unrelated” to her field.
Fehlings allegedly “confiscated” her research and “reassigned her work”, the statement of claim says. She was, she says, instructed “not to attend the workplace or attend at employment conferences.”
A settlement, signed in draft form in December 2003, is in dispute. U of T insists the settlement is valid, while Schwartz does not.
The Ontario Human Rights Commission is also processing a complaint from Schwartz. She has also initiated a complaint against Fehlings with the Ontario College of Physicians and Surgeons.
