Second woman joins lawsuit against union leader Jon Hendry.
Claims sexual harassment while working with Hendry
A second woman has joined a lawsuit accusing a prominent film union official of sexual harassment.
Madeleine Lauve, who says in the lawsuit that she was an employee of IATSE Local 480, charges that its longtime business agent, Jon Hendry, subjected her to “discriminatory conditions, including an explicit quid pro quo for sex.”
The accusations come less than a week after another former employee filed the lawsuit, taking on the prominent local labor union official who has close ties to Democratic Party officials and bringing to New Mexico’s film community a movement against harassment that has rattled the entertainment industry.
Amended late Monday to include Lauve’s allegations, the lawsuit says Lauve worked for IATSE Local 480 under Hendry’s management from 2013 to March 2014.
The lawsuit says Lauve was trying to establish membership in the union, too.
During that time, the lawsuit says, Hendry “coerced her consent to sexual advances, and against coming forward and complaining earlier.”
But the lawsuit says she was terminated when the work environment became hostile and aggressive and Lauve “ceased to consent to and begun [sic] to oppose Hendry’s quid pro quo.”
The lawsuit alleged Hendry had bragged of how he had destroyed careers and the lives of those who had opposed him.
Examples of how he made good on such threats were common knowledge in the workplace and industry, the lawsuit says.
Lauve claims she became an example, too, alleging in the lawsuit that she was never called again for union work and had to leave the state to find employment.
“Other IATSE management observed and knew how Hendry exploited his position and female members and employees. But IATSE left him in a place of authority he used and continues to use to retaliate against and blacklist plaintiffs and … other women who declined or ceased consenting to his sexual demands,” the lawsuit says.
Trent Howell, the lawyer representing Lauve, declined to comment, as did a lawyer representing IATSE Local 480.
The updated lawsuit adds several counts to the civil complaint, including racketeering.
Meanwhile, an official with the IATSE’s international union confirmed over the weekend it had opened an investigation into allegations against Hendry.
On Monday, the AFL-CIO — a national coalition of labor unions — confirmed Hendry was no longer serving as president of the New Mexico Federation of Labor. A lawyer for the local union declined to comment Tuesday on whether Hendry continues to work as its business agent, a job for which he was paid a salary of more than $130,000 in 2016, according to U.S. Labor Department reports.