(Photograph with the aid of Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via AP)

A federal choose dominated in want of Fox Information’ movement for summary judgment to dismiss Jennifer Eckhart’s 2020 claims against the cable information community concerning allegations of sexual assault and an unsafe work surroundings.

A Fox News spokesperson told Mediaite, “We’re proud of the courtroom’s resolution.”

Eckhart alleged in the lawsuit that she was once violently raped by means of former Fox News anchor Ed Henry and sued each Henry and Fox Information, claiming they didn’t correctly inspect Henry’s behavior.

Decide Ronnie Abrams (disclosure: sister to Mediaite owner and founder Dan Abrams) granted Fox’s motion for abstract judgment “in its entirety.” She additionally granted Henry’s motion for summary judgment regarding Eckhart’s revenge porn claims, however allowed her claims for “gender-encouraged violence, assault, battery, sex trafficking and harassment” to maneuver forward.

A legal filing from attorneys representing Eckhart make clear Fox Information’s latest movement for summary judgment filings. Mediaite’s Diana Falzone and Sarah Rumpf reported on November:

Eckhart sued Fox News and former host Ed Henry in 2020 over her declare that Henry had violently raped her in 2017. Henry has vehemently denied the accusations. Fox News stated they fired Henry straight away after studying of Eckhart’s claims. In a previous statement, the community stated, “Upon first studying of Jennifer Eckhart’s allegations in 2020, Fox Information at once performed an investigation by means of an out of doors independent regulation firm, which resulted in senior administration and HR terminating Ed Henry inside six days.” Eckhart has contested each of their debts in the past.

On Wednesday, Eckhart’s criminal tips Michael J. Willemin, a accomplice at Wigdor LLP, filed a 39-page movement that Mediaite has got. The prison transient opposing Fox’s motion for summary judgment precise surprising new claims that Henry also assaulted another Fox Information female colleague during his tenure on the network and multiple Fox Information staffers alerted firm brass to their concerns about him, together with other previously unreported allegations of sexual misconduct and harassment at Fox News with the aid of other male employees nonetheless employed by means of the network.

Fox Information claimed in its abstract judgment submitting, which was once made in September, that they handled the information of Henry’s habits with alacrity and offered a timeline that runs counter to Willemin’s claims of ignoring movements that associated explicitly to hers and Henry’s interactions. Further, in a deposition beneath oath, Eckhart admitted that she didn’t go to Fox News about any allegations regarding Henry until two weeks after she had been dismissed from the community.

A key problem in this legal continuing is what the network knew and when. Fox News insists that the evidence — as they existing it — evidently displays that they weren’t aware about any sexual interactions between the 2 workers. And after they changed into aware, they acted abruptly — firing Henry six days later.

All events agreed that there have been three sexual encounters between Henry and Eckhart. The final come upon befell on Feb. 27, and neither Henry nor Eckhart informed somebody at the community. Fox did study of an April 17 consensual affair between Henry and every other employee who wished to alert management about it. Fox News insists that all allegations were investigated however not substantiated.

The preliminary remark in Fox Information’s motion for summary judgment encapsulates the community’s place on the subject:

Eckhart admits that she informed no one at FNN about Henry’s alleged misconduct both at the time it was once taking place or right through the entire time she labored at FNN. Quite, Eckhart raised these allegations with FNN for the first time via her legal professionals on June 25, 2020—three years after the alleged harassment ended, and two weeks after Eckhart used to be terminated via FNN for longstanding, unremedied performance failures. Even supposing Eckhart was now not employed by way of FNN, upon hearing of Ms. Eckhart’s allegations, FNN President Jay Wallace and Executive Vice President of Human Tools Kevin Lord suspended Henry that very day, took him off the air, and straight away employed an unbiased legislation agency to analyze. Significantly, all over that investigation Eckhart refused to reveal her communications with Henry—communications that, as FNN discovered in discovery, contained a lot of sexually provocative messages and intimate photographs that Eckhart despatched to Henry and that she conspicuously disregarded from her Complaint. FNN’s out of doors investigator issued findings, and Wallace and Lord fired Henry for his admitted violations of administrative center coverage six days after FNN first bought Eckhart’s complaint. On the identical day as Henry’s termination, Wallace and FNN CEO Suzanne Scott knowledgeable all employees that FNN had bought a criticism of sexual misconduct in opposition to Henry, investigated, and fired him—and reminded everybody that FNN prohibits all kinds of sexual harassment, misconduct, and discrimination.

The summary judgment filing also laid out what the network deemed to be Eckhart’s “giant efficiency deficiencies” as an Associate Producer at Fox Business as a pretext for her evaluation, “efficiency improvement plan,” and eventual dismissal from the community, all before she made anyone at Fox aware about any interactions with Henry. Willemin counters via arguing, “the file is replete with disputes about whether Ms. Eckhart’s performance was once, in reality, terrible.”

Fox Information terminated Eckhart’s employment on June 12, 2020. On June 25, 2020, two weeks after her termination, her lawyer communicated, for the primary time, the allegation that Henry had sexually careworn Eckhart. Fox News request for abstract judgment claims “Eckhart alleges that Henry’s unsuitable behavior started in or around 2014 and culminated in her alleged rape in February 2017. However, all through the whole route of her employment at FNN, Eckhart never once complained that she had been sexually harassed by Henry—or raised any concerns about Henry at all—regardless of having plentiful opportunity to take action.”

Abrams judgement integrated the following:

As a threshold subject, there’s no direct evidence that Fox Information was once privy to Henry’s alleged harassment of Eckhart earlier than it passed off. Eckhart acknowledges that she did not tell anyone at the network about their relationship except after she used to be terminated in mid-2020. See Eckhart Rule 56.1 Stmt. to Fox ¶ 150. Nor is there any indication that Henry published their relationship to others, or that Fox News administration or HR in any other case realized about it.

Making an attempt to plug this evidentiary hole, Eckhart asserts that Fox News knew that Henry used to be harassing other girls at the community, which put it on discover that he may do the identical (or Case 1:20-cv-05593-RA-GWG Document 472 Filed 03/12/25 web Page 38 of fifty 39 worse) to her. She points to several items of evidence in give a boost to of that concept, together with that Fox Information knew about Henry’s extramarital affairs, that ladies got here ahead with accusations in opposition to him in April 2017 and that Fox News despatched him to intercourse rehabilitation therapy in Could 2016…No affordable jury may in finding Fox Information in charge according to that proof. For starters, even if Fox Information ultimately discovered about Henry’s extramarital affairs, it did not know about many of them until after Eckhart and Henry’s remaining sexual come across in 2017…..As a result of there’s no evidence that Fox Information discovered about these affairs except April 2017 or later, no affordable jury might find that they put it on discover that Henry would assault her.

Fox News did not have actual notice of Henry’s alleged misconduct towards her unless she first stated it to the network thru her assistance on June 25, 2020—three years after their remaining sexual stumble upon. Eckhart Rule 56.1 Stmt. to Fox ¶ 151. Once the network finally discovered of his conduct, its response used to be the opposite of forgiveness: it hastily investigated and terminated him just six days later. Identification. ¶ 174. Because no cheap jury might to find on this document that Fox Information condoned Henry’s behavior toward Eckhart after studying of it, summary judgment is granted as to this declare.

At bottom, no cheap juror could conclude that Eckhart engaged in secure job when she complained of a toxic environment on the February 10, 2020 meeting, or that such a criticism was causally tied to her placement on a PIP or later termination. These deficiencies on my own foreclose Eckhart’s claim.

Nothing signifies that Eckhart’s performance considerations had been “fabricated or exaggerated,” regardless of Eckhart’s claim on the contrary. Eckhart Opp. to Fox at 33. As a result of Eckhart bargains nothing indicating pretext, her declare additionally fails on the 1/3 step of the McDonnell-Douglas framework.

Ultimately, Fox News moves for abstract judgment on Eckhart’s common-law declare that Fox News negligently supervised, retained and disciplined Henry. It argues that this declare is categorically barred by using the New York Staff’ Compensation Regulation, which supplies the exclusively remedy for damages allegedly as a result of the negligence of an enterprise. Fox News Br. at 33. The Courtroom consents. Because the New York Workers’ Compensation Law states, “[t]he proper to compensation or advantages underneath this chapter, can be the unique remedy to an worker . . . when such employee is injured or killed via the negligence or improper of some other in the identical employ.” ….Eckhart conceded this level at oral argument and advanced no argument that might keep this claim. The Courtroom to that end grants Fox Information’ motion for summary judgment on this declare.

The submit Decide Dismisses All Charges In opposition to Fox Information in Jennifer Eckhart-Ed Henry Case first regarded on Mediaite.