Former Rutgers’ Employee Sues School and College Dean in Discrimination lawsuit

Rutgers University and Douglass Residential College Dean, Jacquelyn Litt is facing a discrimination lawsuit filed by a former employee of the school for hating lesbians.

Laura Federico, the plaintiff, was removed from her senior-level public relations job at the university. Federico claims that Litt disliked lesbians and 'felt that women who had men behind them were stronger and better employees.'

"The fact that plaintiff was a lesbian was not a secret and, in fact, plaintiff kept a picture of her wife on her desk," her complaint reads.

Federico, a Bloomfield resident, filed the lawsuit in January. The Home News Tribune, a New Jersey based newspaper acquired a copy of her lawsuit when it was transferred to the court in New Brunswick in August from a Superior Court in Newark, where it was originally filed.

The lawsuit also states that Federico, a former editor for the weekly Montclair Times who was recruited by the university in November 2011 was cautioned by her colleagues that Litt 'did not respect lesbians' and that many former gay women in the office had either been forced to quit, relocate or were fired.

Dismissing the allegations on Litt, the university stated that Federico was fired last October as she failed to meet deadlines. It also argues that the dean was very well aware of her sexual orientation and that was not the main criteria of her work assessment. Further, it claims that the ex-employee's work needed 'substantial revisions, changes or reworking.'