Plaintiff's motion to exclude introduction of her email exchanges involving sexual content in a sexual harassment matter denied because the emails were probative on issue of whether plaintiff was subjectively offended by alleged harasser's comments.

In Seybert, the plaintiff sought to exclude the introduction of a number of her email exchanges, which involved sexual content, pursuant to Federal Rule of Evidence 412. After an in camera review, the court denied the plaintiff's motion, holding that the relevance of the emails substantially outweighs any prejudice to the plaintiff. In so holding, the court determined that the emails with sexual content involve the same general type of humor as the alleged harasser's comments to the plaintiff and are, therefore, probative on the plaintiff's burden of proving that she was subjectively offended and that a reasonable person in like circumstances would have been detrimentally affected by the alleged harassment.

Case Law Alert - 1st Qtr 2010