Sexual Harassment Suit Against Executive Settled

Toyota Motor Corp. and a former employee who filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against the top executive of the automaker’s North American corporate unit have settled the case, the automaker said Friday.

Terms of the agreement between Japan’s largest auto company and Sayaka Kobayashi, 42, who was an assistant to former Toyota North America Chief Executive Hideaki Otaka, are not being disclosed, said Steve Curtis, a company spokesman in New York. He said Toyota would have no further comment.

Kobayashi filed her suit May 2 in New York State Supreme Court, alleging that Otaka, 65, repeatedly made unwanted sexual advances after she began working for him last year.

Kobayashi, seeking $190 million in damages, said the conduct continued for several months until she was involuntarily transferred out of the job.

Otaka, who had headed the New York-based operation that represents Toyota’s corporate and philanthropic interests in North America, retired a week after the suit was filed.

He was replaced by James Press, who had been head of the automaker’s separate, Torrance-based U.S. sales and marketing arm, Toyota Motor Sales America.

Toyota said at the time that it would increase harassment awareness training and that it had established a group led by former U.S. Labor Secretary Alexis M. Herman to critique its workplace policies.

“We are very pleased to have resolved this matter in a way that all parties have agreed is fair, appropriate and mutually satisfactory to all concerned,” attorneys for Toyota and Kobayashi said in a joint statement.