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  6.  » Employee suspended for ‘hate crime’ of believing in two genders beats the charges

Samantha Watkins — The College Fix July 25, 2016

Restored ‘without loss of pay’

A Jesuit university employee who was suspended and investigated for the “hate crime” of believing in two genders has been reinstated by the school.

Her identity was also revealed for the first time by the religious freedom law firm that took her case, the California-based Freedom of Conscience Defense Fund (FCDF).

The law firm declined to tell The College Fix how it persuaded Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles to reinstate alumni relations employee Gigi Kurz and remove the black mark from her record.

The FCDF has filed a few defamation suits against institutions that allegedly smeared its clients.

President and Chief Counsel Charles LiMandri even threatened to file suit against a law professor, the college that employed him and a newspaper for an op-ed that LiMandri said defamed him personally.

No apology from accusing students

Kurz was investigated by LMU’s Bias Incident Response Team, which roped in the Los Angeles Police Department, after female students reported Kurz for “denying transgenderism.”

The students were hanging up “pansexual” signs for the school’s pro-LGBTQ Rainbow Week when Kurz approached them and, according to the 15-year employee, respectfully shared her traditional Catholic view of sexuality. One of the students identifies as “gender-neutral.”

In a glowing July 15 letter from Kurz to LiMandri and “Paul” – presumably FCDF lawyer Paul Jonna – the newly reinstated Loyola employee praised the firm for putting the university “on notice that they were not dealing with amateurs.”

“You established that LMU was the one violating their own policies in protecting the deceitful behaviors of the LGBT students [who were hanging signs], and in that, promoting anti-Catholicism,” Kurz wrote. She was restored to her position “without loss of pay.”

“I was frantic and you calmed me down … And then you turned the table around on the whole issue to go on the attack,” Kurz continued, calling herself a new “lifetime contributor” to the firm’s work.

Kurz told The Fix that she was on vacation and couldn’t comment on the resolution of the dispute until she returned.

In a phone interview with The Fix, LiMandri said the FCDF asked the university to investigate the alleged discrimination committed by Kurz against the students, rather than simply take the students’ word for it, but he said the university ignored it.

LMU said the request had to come directly from Kurz, according to LiMandri: “That’s the most ridiculous thing.” LMU did not respond to a Fix request for comment.

As for the provisions of Kurz’s reinstatement, LiMandri said there was no “money exchange” and that there are “no restrictions whatsoever” on Kurz’s interactions with students going forward.

All Kurz wanted was “to make sure she would not be persecuted for her beliefs as a devoted Catholic,” as she had expressed them to the students who filed the complaint, LiMandri said. “She just wanted to resume her job and help people.”

Continues …