Finra sues former employee for sexual harassment

Ling Chan, a former financial operations examiner for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, has been hit with a sexual harassment lawsuit from her former employer after being fired. According to the lawsuit, filed in the Supreme Court of the State of New York, County of New York, Ms. Chan was fired from Finra after repeatedly making “unwelcome romantic overtures” to a male co-worker, then subsequently applying for 82 different positions at the regulator on more than 500 occasions, using more than 150 different user accounts and 11 different email addresses. After being rejected each time she tried to rejoin the authority, she set her sights on John Braut, a human resources senior director at Finra, in what the complaint alleges to be the final straw in her “never-ending harassment of Finra's employees.” That included using Mr. Braut's Finra email address to sign him up for subscriptions to pornographic magazines, creating a profile for Mr. Braut on Jerk.com, and wishing death upon him in the comments section of a Columbus Dispatch article, according to the court filing. Ms. Chan initiated unwanted sexual advances upon the co-worker in December 2011 and after countless attempts to see him in a consensual social setting, the suit claims, she began to give him gifts in the office and stalk him on the subway. She was let go on Feb. 22, 2012 after she ignored an order to limit her communications with the employee to business-related matters. The suit claims that Ms. Chan “seriously interfered with Finra's systems and caused a huge waste of employee time.” It seeks unspecified damages and injunctive relief. Since her departure from the regulator, she has “bombarded” Finra's online ethics board with more than 150 complaints while ignoring requests to cease and desist, according to the court filings. A Finra spokeswoman declined to comment. Ms. Chan could not be reached.