Thanks. Sadly I am speaking from experience. After saying "this isn't going to happen anymore, don't contact me, we can't work it out" was worse than what had been happening. People (men and women) who are stalkers, abusers, and harassers will go to extreme methods to terrorize and manipulate to hurt and control the other person. Often it is turned around to where the perpetrator makes it look like the victim is really the perpetrator. My breaking point was having false police reports filed against me that made me look like I was victimizing him, so I couldn't even count on the police to make me feel safe and help me. Thankfully I had enough evidence and people to back me up he finally stopped. I know he is still doing stuff and keeping tabs on me, but it isn't as obvious and people are on to him.

The only part I blame on myself is that I let shame control me into not telling people who needed to know and could help me. These people count on embarrassment and shame of their victims. I'm a highly educated independent woman, with friends and family who are involved in my life, and that just made it worse to admit I "let this happen to me" but there wasn't a "let" involved, sometimes it just happens no matter how we protect ourselves. I genuinely thought he wasn't stupid enough to take it that far but the fact is these people aren't stupid, they are highly intelligent, charming, and diabolical which make them so good at affecting people. I learned so much about technology and how to spoof my phone number for calls and texts, fake my email address, and get onto my home wireless network (my idiot roommate didn't see anything wrong with letting him check his email and gave him the password).

I wasn't suggesting that you were wrong. I was sharing my experience where I did erase harassing messages and got the WTF? look from the police; hopefully I won't be harassed/stalked by a friend's crazy ex, but if I do I won't erase his messages! ;)

You're right in saying that private life is private life; some of us, however, have jobs where we're not in the office all the time during business hours and need to be contacted. I'm all over the city at construction sites during the day--how could my company not have a cell phone/BlackBerry number for me? It's not as if my boss or even another co-worker is calling me on a Sunday night just to chat or harass me. One of my good friends is an executive assistant--we've been out on a Saturday night and she gets calls from her boss regarding a major deal that's going to go through on Monday. He tries not to do it, but sometimes it can't be avoided. Again, I'm just sharing my experiences, that it's not always easy to just "turn off" your cell phone in some professions.

Agreed that there are some jobs where you're offsite a good deal of the time - but if you have one of those, the company needs to sport you a cell phone, 100% on their dime. I sure as hell am not going to use up my personal minutes on whether or not the building on the cover of the Power Point presentation should have a green or blue welcome mat in front of it.

If you give people an inch they will take a mile. It's nice to think that everyone would be kind and considerate about things like that, but sadly, that's too often not the case - not even getting to things like sexual harassment. Then again, I'm sure my opinion at present is colored by some of the douchebags I've been working with recently who think everyone is there for their amusement or to do their bidding.

Harrassment
 

By doing a little searching, you may find an attorney who will not charge you for the initial visit while he or she decides if you have a viable case and you decide if you want to pursue a legal solution.

I would have the attorney write a representation letter, not to your boss, but to the company VP who is in charge of HR. The HR guy sounds like a jerk who intends to do nothing to resolve the situation. You will get an executive's attention if he believes there will be legal ramifications with media contact, bad publicity and a monetary penalty.

You are smart to document everything but print out those e-mails you sent home or you could lose them if your computer crashes.

Are there any other women in your office who have experienced something similar? Definitely talk with them...they will be an invaluable source of support.

Best of luck to you and please let us know what happens.

Paula M
Sigma Delta Tau
Patrae Multi Spes Una
One Hope of Many People

Unless her lawyer advises her to do this, I think this might be a bad idea. Since we don't have all the info, we don't know how something that appears innocuous might affect her case.

I think she's past our advice at this point: she's in her lawyer's hands now. (But you're in our thoughts, GM! Well, at least, you're in mine. Good luck!)

Yeah, this is a pretty strong case of not letting your left hand know what your right hand is doing, or however that saying goes. No one should know what's going on until it happens--too many people gossip and it's just not cool.

HR is not your friend. That goes for everyone and in every company (sorry to anyone who works in HR!). While they are there somewhat to help the employee, their main purpose is to protect the employer from any potential employment claims. At my one of my previous jobs, HR fired a guy because he was harassing one of my co-workers. Do you think HR did this out of the kindness of their hearts and because they didn't want my co-worker to feel awkward everyday? Nope. I'm sure they felt bad for her but the main reason they fired the guy was to cover the company's ass.

Contact an attorney. An attorney will be able to guide you through the HR minefield. An attorney is there to give you advice on how to professionally, ethically and legally handle your situation.