Look at this crazy |expletive| by the hearthstone homes owner!
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Omaha, NE - A well-known Omaha builder is accused of pressuring employees into unusual behavior at work. Former workers at Hearthstone Homes come forward after a federal lawsuit exposes complaints about the company and it's CEO.
A picture of a woman hugging her two small children, a smile replacing what Jammie Harms describes as a terribly troubling and humiliating time while pregnant with her son. Harms filed a lawsuit accusing her former boss of calling her unborn child hostile, suggesting it had a negative agenda.
Harms claims Hearthstone Homes CEO John Smith felt he was spiritually connected to her fetus and it "was creating a negative energy in the work place". I go to Hearthstone Homes for answers. "I think it's important to note that she was terminated with the company, let go with the company, as a result of a number of people let go with the company," says Neil Smith, the V.P. of of the popular home building company. Smith, not related to John Smith, insists Harms was let go as part of a 40 percent staff reduction due to the economy. Harms was executive assistant to the CEO. Her lawsuit accuses Hearthstone of religious and gender discrimination.
Our investigation uncovers other former employees not shocked by Harm's lawsuit. "It's 100 percent religious based, he would tell us about his Unity church, his past life experiences," says Mike Boyd. Boyd worked for Hearthstone for six years. Boyd insists CEO Smith and other company leaders forced what he calls, their religious beliefs, on every employee. If you worked there you were required to attend Mind, Body, and Energy sessions or MBE, a practice the company describes as holistic and good for their business. "If you don't continue on in these courses, you know, they had certain ones you need to go to, basically you're not going to move up in the company or be forced out," says Boyd. Boyd also says every employee had to go at least once a week.
Former Hearthstone sales manager John Risley was also pressured to attend MBE. "Do you feel like it was a job requirement to attend these sessions," I ask. Risley answers, "It would never show up on job description, but yeah, if you didn't follow in those footsteps, follow in that path, you were frowned upon by John and became a target." Hearthstone's V.P. admits the company offers MBE but employees decide if they want to go. "Do you force employees to take part in any type of religious practices," I ask. Neil Smith responds, "No, we make opportunities available for them and we have some people who choose not to participate in those and we have others who willingly choose to be a part of that."
In her lawsuit, Harms insists she too was forced to attend MBE sessions to clear her negative energy. She resisted and eventually was let go, she was five months pregnant. Neil Smith responds, "I don't know of any specific conversations where she was forced to do anything so that would surprise me if she was."
I ask Risley, "When you hear that a former employee has filed suit saying that John Smith said her fetus was hostile, what's your reaction to that?" He responds, "When we base buying land by the amount of land fairies that are on the land, nothing surprises me." If you didn't catch that, he said land fairies. Risley claims that's one way Smith decided to buy land for a future subdivision. Other decisions were based on muscle testing. Former employees show me what muscle testing is. They say Smith would ask a question and if your fingers could be pulled apart, the muscle was weak and the answer no. If your fingers stayed together, it was strong or yes. "We would base hiring and firing people on muscle testing," says Risley.
I ask Neil Smith, "So muscle testing is sometimes used as a way to make business decisions here?" He responds, "There are a number of practices that we would use that traditionally may not have been considered traditional business practices, but we look at a more holistic way of making those decisions."
So if things were so bizarre why did all of these employees stay? "Whether they believed it or not they would agree with him and go along with him because they were scared of their job," says Risley. Boyd answers, "It was completely cult-like. You were either in the cult, you pretended to be in the cult, or you avoided the cult and those were the people that were forced out ."
Whether or not Harms' suit will stick, I ask the vice president flat out, did the CEO call her fetus hostile. "Did it happen?" Neil Smith answers, "I think those specific questions will be answered through the course of the lawsuit." I ask, "So, you can't tell me if he did say that?" "No," Smith responds. "So there is a possibility that he did say that?" I ask. "I suppose, there's also a possibility he didn't say that," Smith closes with.
Risley and Boyd were both fired by Hearthstone. They told me they couldn't sue because they accepted the company's severance package. Jammie Harms is not the first former Hearthstone employee to sue the company for religious discrimination. A sales associate filed suit several years ago and won. The judgement was one dollar.
Reported by Molli Graham