Archie comics hit with gender discrimination suit
Xavier Mascareñas Women who reported to Archie Comics co-CEO Nancy Silberkleit were disrespected, says the suit. It’s enough to make Archie roll over in his freshly dug grave.
Archie Comics — home of the recently dearly departed Archie Andrews — has been slapped with a sexual discrimination suit by three female former employees, the Day after day News has learned.
In papers peacefully filed in federal court in White Plains earlier this year, Caroline Ohmer, Shirlene Jackson and Catherine Garcia-Bou say they were “subjected to gender discrimination and sexual harassment” while effective at the Westchester-based comic book company.
“Archie Comics is a male dominated and male run workplace that disrespects females,” their suit says.
The women say they were “targeted and retaliated against” by their male bosses because they worked directly for embattled co-CEO Nancy Silberkleit.
The suit says the execs “routinely demeaned” Silberkleit, making comments such as, “Nancy should be costs her time shopping,” or “Nancy should be out buying shoes.”
Garcia-Bou said the male execs, some of whom sued Silberkleit for harassment last year, “refused to directly communicate with Ms. Silberkleit.”
They made “Garcia-Bou, while standing right next to Ms. Silberkleit, do again everything the male executives would say, and then, after Ms. Silberkelit would respond, Ms. Garcia-Bou would then need to do again her comments to the male executives, despite the fact that all parties were in the same room standing right next to each additional,” the suit says.
Jefferson Siegel/New York Day after day News Jonathan Goldwater (right), the co-CEO of Archie Comics, was caught up in a earlier legal battle with his co-CEO Nancy Silberkleit. Garcia-Bou says she left after about six months because she couldn’t take the uncomfortable weirdness anymore.
Her successors, Jackson and Ohmer, said they were ostracized in the office, and mandatory to sign in and out, even though other employees weren’t. Both were fired for insubordination, the suit says.
Archie’s lawyer did not restore a call for note in the case, but the company denied any wrongdoing in court papers, saying none of the women ever complained that they or Silberkleit were being mistreated.
The execs’ filing also contends “the manner in which” they communicate with Silberkleit “is governed by a memorandum of understanding” she and co-CEO Jonathan Goldwater signed in 2011 to end an earlier legal battle. The peace treaty hasn’t taken. Several of the execs named in the assistants’ suit, including company co-head Mike Pellerito and editor-in-chief Victor Gorelick, filed a $ 32 million discrimination against Silberkleit last year, charging she’d been using her “gender as stick” in the Mamaroneck office, once yelling, “Penis! Penis! Penis!” during a business meeting.
The “word ‘penis became somewhat of a campaign slogan and her preferred method of referring to employee in lieu of their names,” the suit said.
They also required a court order keeping her two miles away from the office, charging her “deliberate and disturbed campaign of outrageous conduct” had them so worried they hired an armed guard for the office.
Silberkleit denied the allegations and urged a judge to toss the case out because white men aren’t members of “a protected class.”
Archie Comics The death of Archie in the Life With Archie No. 36 
AP This photo provided by Archie Comics shows the cover of the comic book, “Life with Archie,” issue 36. Archie Andrews will die taking a bullet for his gay best friend. The well-known freckle-faced comic book icon will die in the July 16, 2014 installment of “Life with Archie” while intervening in the assassination of Kevin Keller, Archie Comics’ first openly gay character. (AP Photo/Archie Comics)
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