A female employee of the Jersey City Department of Public Safety, specifically working for parking enforcement, alleges in a Hudson County Superior Court lawsuit that her boss threatened to kill her, called her a b**** and groped her as part of ongoing harassment.
By John Heinis/Hudson County View
In a lawsuit filed on Friday, Visitacion Sardinas, who has worked for the city’s parking enforcement since 2014, says that Vincent Caruso was one of her superiors and had engaged in conduct that includes sexual harassment since 2015.
“By his actions, Defendant, Caruso, caused a harmful and offensive physical sexual contact with Plaintiff,” the suit says.
“On September 14, 2017, Mr. Caruso threatened to kill Plaintiff, pushed her up against the wall, put his face against hers and started to spread saliva all over her face while grabbing his testicles,” further claiming that Caruso threw a garbage can at Sardinas the following day.
Additionally, Sardinas, through her attorney Corinne Mullen, says she reported Caruso’s actions to Deputy Director of Human Resources Mark Bunbury on two occasions: September 20th, 2017 and February 6th, 2018.
However, the suit says that the situation continued to worsen after February 6th, since Caruso then continued “calling and texting her lewd messages.”
In totality, the lawsuit accuses Caruso of sexual assault, sexual harassment under the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination, intentional inflection of emotional distress and negligence, as well as alleging Jersey City participated in negligence and negligent supervision.
The court filing also calls for the preservation of evidence, which includes, but is not limited to: closed circuit TV footages, computer images, spread sheets, employment messages, memos, social media posts and text messages.
A city spokeswoman said that they do not comment on personnel issues when asked about the lawsuit.
