Local

Two women never receive payment after sexual harassment judgment

BREMERTON, Wash. — Two local women who sued the parent company of a Bremerton bowling alley for sexual harassment say they never received a dime of their $565,000 judgment.

The women were both security guards at Bremerton Lanes and Casino at different times, between 2007 and 2009.

The bowling alley closed in 2010.

The women allege their boss, Roy Ladele Pierce, threatened to fire them if they did not send him nude photos of themselves.

The allegations came several months before law enforcement found a large amount of child porn in Pierce’s Kitsap home in 2010.

He is currently serving a 14-year sentence, after pleading guilty to first-degree child molestation, possession of child pornography and voyeurism.

Plaintiffs A and B

One of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit said she was working full-time as a security guard at Bremerton Lanes and Casino, making $11 per hour when the harassment began.
 
KIRO 7 is only identifying her as 'Plaintiff A.'
 
Her manager, Pierce, "would ask for pictures of my private areas, and if I didn't do it, he would threaten that I would lose my job," she said. "I was scared because I had to keep my job, for my family."

She told KIRO 7 that Pierce would blackmail her by burning the pictures onto CDs.

“He talked to other employees about it. He would make these CDs anytime he got someone to do the pictures,” said Plaintiff A. “He would show them to the person who sent the pictures, but he would never give it to them.”

She was also convinced that the other employees who worked there at the time knew what was going on.

“You would hear from other people that they saw everything you did,” she told KIRO 7. “It was widely known around the entire bowling alley, and there were many other victims of it as well.

The other woman, who KIRO 7 identifies as Plaintiff B, also worked at Bremerton Lanes as a security guard, and Pierce was also her manager.

She said he threatened to fire her if she didn’t send him nude photos of herself.

“He flat out was like, ‘if you don’t take these pictures for me, I will fire you,” she said. “And I needed the job.”

She said she got angry when Pierce started showing the pictures to coworkers. That’s when she decided to come forward and complain.

“If he was doing it to me, then he was doing it to more people,” she said.

She told KIRO 7 that after she refused him, Pierce fired her.

Taking Bremerton Lanes to court

Plaintiff B said it felt important to file a lawsuit against Pierce’s boss, because she believes it was well-known throughout the bowling alley that Pierce was harassing other female employees.

“I just wanted my story out there. I wanted other females to understand that if they went through this, they could be strong enough to go out and tell someone it happened to them,” she said.

During the August 2013 judgment against Pierce’s employer, Star Westsound LLC, as many as 10 former Bremerton Lanes employees shared their stories of sexual harassment.

The jury ruled in favor of the women, ruling that their employer, Star Westsound LLC and its owner Franklin Evans, were legally liable for sexual harassment and creating a hostile work environment.

The judgment -- $565,000. The jury also awarded attorney’s fees, for a total of $646,000.

Four years later, no payout

It’s been eight years since Pierce’s sexual harassment began and nearly four years since the women received the judgment.

However, neither woman has received a dime.

Bremerton Lanes went out of business shortly after the women came forward. Star Westsound LLC claims that it has no assets to pay the judgment, according to the women’s attorney, Terry Venneberg of Gig Harbor.

But Star Westsound LLC’s owner, Franklin Evans, does have assets. He also owns Kenmore Lanes, in Kenmore.

Venneberg told KIRO 7, the fact that his clients haven’t been paid is intentional.

“The managing member (Evans) knew on some level that something was happening,” said Venneberg. “He disclaimed any knowledge of the particulars, but I think it’s fair to say he did not have a quality person (Pierce) in that position … and he didn’t do anything about it.”

Venneberg told KIRO 7 that the Limited Liability Company structure puts especially low-wage workers at risk.

“If this happens to you, there’s no accountability,” Venneberg said. “Basically, they thumb their noses at you.”

Picking up the pieces

Venneberg said that the vulnerability of Plaintiff A and B -- the fact they were both paid minimum wage -- made them easy prey for Pierce.

“The catastrophic events are even more pronounced if you have someone who is living paycheck to paycheck, living on the edge,” said Venneberg. “They face the prospect of losing their job if they don’t adhere to what their manager is asking for.

Plaintiff A told KIRO that she was ‘relieved’ to be awarded that money and planned to use it to buy a house.

But after five years and no payout, she is angry.

“The fight was hard because we were dragged through the dirt. We were made to look like we weren’t anything better than an old penny on the ground,” she said. “People like us, we work hard for the money we have and we pretty much get pooped on."

The fact that Evans and Star Westsound LLC have not paid her makes the pain even worse, she told KIRO 7, because it appears Evans won’t take responsibility for the actions of his employee.

“To know he’s the owner, and has the money, I think it makes it worse,” said Plantiff A. “He has it and he doesn’t care.”

Plaintiff B said the judgment helped her feel validated.

“It showed I wasn’t lying or saying that it just happened,” she said. “When someone else said it was also sexual harassment, it made me feel a little better about it.”

However, eight years later, she still feels a sense of shame.

“Honestly,” she said, “I think I’m going to feel ashamed my entire life.”

KIRO 7 reached out to Franklin Evans for comment, leaving him voice and email messages for him and his attorney, Walter H. Olsen, at Olsen’s Puyallup law office.

So far, neither Evans nor Olsen have responded.