Bruce Schanzer, CEO and president of Cedar Realty Trust
NEW YORK CITY—Cedar Realty Trust's CEO and president, Bruce Schanzer, was accused of sexual discrimination by Nancy Mozzachio, the former COO of the company, in a lawsuit filed in Brooklyn state court on Thursday.
Mozzachio's complaint alleges that for several years, up to the date of her termination on February 12, 2016, Schanzer sexually harassed her, creating a hostile work environment. The complaint claims Schanzer regularly leered at Mozzachio's breasts and made inappropriate comments, including about her breasts such as "I see you have double D's today."
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The pleading claims Schanzer repeated called Mozzachio "babe," even though he knew this made her uncomfortable. It alleges Schanzer made inappropriate comments to Mozzachio's husband, Michael Mozzachio, about performing oral sex on his wife Nancy Mozzachio, in her presence.
Nancy Mozzachio had suggested that Schanzer purchase sexual harassment and management software programs, advising him that sexual harassment was prevalent at the company. He responded by becoming irate and yelling at her, according to the complaint.
Nancy Mozzachio, former COO of Cedar Realty, files sexual harassment lawsuit. Mozzachio says she made her complaints about sexual harassment within one week of her termination.
In addition, the complaint alleges that Mozzachio received outstanding performance evaluations throughout her career at Cedar Realty. She was promoted to COO in 2014 and Schanzer has given her a performance evaluation for 2015, rating her as "exceeds expectations."
GlobeSt.com reached out to Cedar Realty requesting a comment from Schanzer. In response, a company representative provided the following statement to GlobeSt.com. "At Cedar Realty Trust, we are proud of our strong and empowering culture and diverse workforce. We take allegations of this nature very seriously and do not tolerate discrimination or harassment of any kind. As a matter of policy we do not comment on pending litigation. That said, we are confident that the case is entirely without merit and we will vigorously defend ourselves against this baseless litigation."
The defendant has not yet filed a response.
The complaint has been filed at a time when sexual harassment has become a topic of national conversation with the multiple accusations against movie producer Harvey Weinstein, Bill O'Reilly, President Donald Trump and other nationally known figures.
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Betsy Kim
Betsy Kim was the bureau chief, East Coast, and New York City reporter for Real Estate Forum and GlobeSt.com. As a lawyer and journalist, Betsy has worked as the director of editorial and content for LexisNexis Lawyers.com, a TV/multi-media journalist for NBC and CBS affiliated TV stations in the Midwest, and an associate producer at Court TV.
