School Board Member Offended by Anatomy Was Accused of Harassment

When the Park Ridge-Niles Elementary District 64 heard public comments this week about the resignation of board member Dathan Paterno for a series of tweets hostile to last weekend's Women's March, including one in which he derided marchers as "vagina screechers," fellow board member Athan "Thomas" Sotos interrupted. He said he was did not want to hear the word "vagina" because he did not want to have to explain it to his children, and it "was not being used in a positive way," according to the Pioneer Press. But Sotos himself has been accused of far more offensive language in a federal lawsuit which was settled out of court for a confidential amount.

Sotos, who was elected to the board in 2015 and who is up for reelection in 2019, may be uncomfortable with the word "vagina," but, according to a 2012 lawsuit filed by 19 women who worked at a restaurant he owned, he was comfortable calling women "by sexually derogatory nicknames." Other allegations leveled against Sotos and manager Dennis Sotos in the lawsuit include grabbing employees, continuously making sexually explicit comments about employees, and putting ice and water down employees' clothes. In addition to harassment, the suit alleged retaliation and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

Employees at the downtown Chicago location of the Sotos' Tilted Kilt restaurant first filed a federal complaint in 2011 with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Tilted Kilt is a franchise with Chicago area locations in Aurora, Bolingbrook, Oakbrook Terrace, Quincy, Rockford, Schaumburg, Skokie and Woodridge, according to the company website.

Athan Sotos and the lawyer for his accusers did not immediately respond to calls requesting comment.

The 2012 federal lawsuit can be found below: