An East Hampton Village Police secretary has filed a discrimination complaint against the village, the department and a former supervisor claiming that she was repeatedly harassed, demeaned and berated and that her reports of the treatment were ignored by department brass.
The secretary, Layla Bennett, has claimed that she was repeatedly victimized and harassed by her former supervisor, recently retired Captain Anthony Long, for a number of years.
In the complaint she filed with the New York State Division of Human Rights, Ms. Bennett says that Capt. Long made “demeaning comments about the way Ms. Bennett looked and dressed” and would call her lazy, threaten to terminate her and subject her to other forms of harassment and verbal abuse on the job.
The claim says that Chief Michael Tracey and some current and former members of the Village Board never took action to stop the inappropriate treatment or to punish Capt. Long, according to her attorney, Alex J. Kaminski.
The complaint by Ms. Bennett was filed last September. The state human rights agency issued a finding of probable cause this week, Mr. Kaminski said, meaning the case will proceed to judicial hearings before a judge.
Mr. Kaminski, in a statement sent to the press on Ms. Bennett’s behalf, said that the complaint ultimately led to Mayor Jerry Larsen, a former chief of the police department who was elected mayor last October, requesting that the Suffolk County Police Internal Affairs Bureau conduct an investigation.
Capt. Long announced his retirement from the department after 28 years on the force in May. Ms. Bennett is still working for the village department.
“Ms. Bennett hopes to continue her career without issue now that her complaints are finally being addressed,” Mr. Kaminski said in the statement.
Some of the claims leveled in Ms. Bennett’s complaint echo similar complaints made by another female employee of the department, Audra Schutte, a former dispatcher, in 2014. Ms. Schutte filed a complaint and ultimately a lawsuit against her male supervisors, including Capt. Long and Mr. Larsen, who was chief of the department at the time. In the lawsuit, she too accused Capt. Long and another supervisor of harassment and verbal abuse. She sued the village for wrongful termination after she was fired by Mr. Larsen in 2013. The lawsuit was settled with the village in 2017. She died in 2019 at age 47.
Staff Writer on Jul 9, 2021