TONAWANDA, N.Y. (WBEN) – Two women who worked for the Town of Tonawanda Police Department's Public Safety Dispatch are suing the police department and their former supervisor over allegations of sexual harassment, sex discrimination, a hostile work environment, and retaliation.
The lawsuit filed last week by Jennifer Murphy and Valerie Hickok claims Brett Rider, who was the acting dispatch supervisor for the police department, harassed the two for more than two decades. They also claim nothing was done to stop the harassment.
VIEW THE LAWSUIT HERE (Warning: Some details may be unsettling)
The harassment included disparaging comments about their looks, offensive and racist insults, and an alleged rape.
WBEN does not usually identify victims of sexual assault but are publishing the names of both Murphy and Hickok with their consent and because it was in the court complaint.
"The behavior that I endured at the Town of Tonawanda Police Department was so horrific," Murphy told WBEN. "I cannot imagine that being tolerated anywhere, much less by the people being paid to protect and serve a community, whose own morals and sense of right and wrong are so deeply, deeply flawed. They tolerated this type of behavior so openly."
Rider was charged last November with rape and sexual assault of three women. One woman was allegedly raped in 2009 and again in 2015, according to the Erie County District Attorney's Office. Rider allegedly forcibly touched a second woman intimately and forced her to touch him. A third victim was allegedly raped after she was locked in a room in 2018 at the police complex with the door blocked and, in another incident, hit in the face while forced to have sex in 2019.
If convicted of all the crimes, Rider could spend the rest of his life in prison. He is currently in jail and cannot post bail.
Rider's criminal defense attorney, Jessica Kulpit, declined comment due to the ongoing criminal case. The trial is expected to begin next March. She is not representing Rider in the civil suit.
The lawsuit claims Murphy and Hickok told the town about Rider's inappropriate behavior for years but the town took no action to alleviate Rider's harassment. Emails were sent in 2012 but there was no action by the town. Meanwhile, the lawsuit said the harassment continued and even expanded with inappropriate remarks about Murphy's teenage daughter.
Town of Tonawanda Supervisor Joe Emminger declined comment on the civil suit this week but said maintains the town acted appropriately upon learning about the harassment.
"Myself and the town board, within 30 minutes of being notified of the alleged actions by the perpetrator of these crimes, the town board acted to suspend him," Emminger said Tuesday. "There are other things that the town has done to protect these women. These women are victims and we took these allegations very, very seriously. Our thoughts are with them to make sure they were protected and we thought that we did protect them after we became aware of it."
Emminger said there is "more to the story" as it relates to the town's role in protecting the women. He declined to say what the specifics were but believed the town board and supervisor were not mentioned in the lawsuit because of their actions. He also said he still has faith in Jim Stauffinger, the current police chief of the town, who was told of the harassment, along with other supervisors.
Murphy said she sent emails to the town but did not get a response.
The two women are represented by Cat McCulle, an attorney with the Law Office of Lindy Korn.
"It takes so much courage just to come forward at all and talk about what happened to you," McCulle said. "Then to have someone on the other side like a defense attorney or someone investigating your complaint having to question you or not believe you, I think that can re-instigate the trauma that may already be there from the underlying harassment."
Murphy said the Western New York region needs more organizations that will listen to women who come forward with stories of sexual harassment and misconduct.
"The only advice I can give is to keep a journal and to write down these things," Murphy said. "Know yourself.
Respect yourself. Any time you feel less than dignified or if someone is talking down to you or stalking you, write it down. You know in your gut what's right and what's wrong. Even if no one is listening to you now, don't stop speaking up. Eventually, hopefully people will be held accountable for their action or, in this case, inaction."
