That's the EEOC's allegation in a lawsuit filed Friday against the Michigan logistics company, and it's not your garden-variety harassment case.
Ryan is the company's president of logistics. He's also on the board of directors and a part owner of the company. According to the complaint, he propositioned employees for years — pornography discussions, requests for massages, promises of promotions and cash bonuses for sexual favors, invitations to his cabin, an offer to let one employee sleep in his hotel room if she got too drunk.
One employee complained to HR back in 2020. The EEOC says HR's response wasn't an investigation. It was a cover-up — allegedly forging a document to discredit her and skipping interviews with witnesses who could've corroborated her story.
Ryan faced no discipline. The harassment allegedly continued at company Christmas parties, then escalated in 2023 against two more employees, A.M. and T.H., both of whom he'd allegedly hand-picked and told they'd "owe him." One of them says he leaned over her desk so closely she could feel his breath.
Employers, "harassment prevention starts at the top" isn't a platitude. It's a structural fact about how power works inside a company.
When the harasser is a line supervisor, HR can investigate, discipline, or fire him without much political cost. When the harasser owns a piece of the company and sits on its board, HR isn't investigating a subordinate. It's investigating a boss. And if this complaint is accurate, that's exactly what broke down here — HR protected the power structure instead of the employee who reported it.
There are a few things this case should drive home for employers:
1. Your harassment policy has to survive contact with leadership. A policy that only works against employees three levels below the C-suite isn't a policy. It's theater.
2. HR needs a reporting line that doesn't run through the accused. If the alleged harasser has enough influence to shape how HR responds, you need an outside investigator, a board-level escalation path, or both.
3. "No prior discipline" isn't a defense once someone's complained. A documented 2020 complaint followed by continued conduct in 2023 is exactly the pattern that turns a harassment claim into an expensive lesson.
Culture doesn't trickle down. Neither does accountability — unless you build a system and a culture that allows it to run uphill, too.