An Amazon employee has alleged that she was raped by a senior executive during a business trip to New York City. She also claimed in a lawsuit that the company told her to keep quiet about the alleged incident and even neglected to perform a full investigation of the allegations.
The alleged victim, Laura Danbom, works at Amazon’s Seattle headquarters as a marketing and operations manager for Amazon Web Services. This week, she sued the e-commerce giant for allegedly subjecting her to a hostile work environment and violating Washington State’s Silenced No More Act, per the New York Post. The act protects victims who speak up about workplace assaults from retaliation.
What was the alleged incident?
The alleged rape happened on October 27, 2023. At the time, Danbom had traveled to New York with a group of colleagues including Michelangelo Simonte, who is a top-performing advertising executive in her division. He was based in Madrid, according to the complaint. Simonte still works for Amazon at its Madrid offices.
The group went to an Amazon-hosted open bar event that evening, and then continued the gathering at karaoke bars. The suit filed in state court in Seattle revealed that all of it was paid for by Amazon.
That evening, initially, Danbom and Simonte “flirted,” “joked” and “got along,” according to the complaint. Later in the night, Simonte “kissed her,” and “persuaded Laura” to let him accompany her to her hotel room, per the complaint.
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Danbom was staying at the Hyatt Place at 140 W. 24th St. in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood, a representative for the plaintiff said, which is where things allegedly took a wrong turn.
“In Laura’s hotel room, during the early morning hours, Simonte raped her,” the complaint alleged. “Before the rape started, she said no. During the rape, Laura asked him: ‘you realize this is,’ and Simonte finished her sentence saying ‘rape? Yes.’ He ignored her protests. He raped her.”
Danbom reported the alleged incident to the New York Police Department the next day. She handed the officers a condom Simonte had left behind, the complaint said. She also submitted a rape kit.
Subsequently, a detective monitored a phone call between Danbom and Simonte for a potential confession. During the call, Simonte said he was “200% sure” that they never had sexual intercourse, according to the complaint. However, he contradicted himself in a police interview later, admitting that he was too drunk to remember.
Danbom’s attorney Jay Free said that the NYPD refused to refer the case to local prosecutors, and that police said they had exhausted all investigative avenues. The complaint accused police of failing to interview the witnesses Danbom reported the rape to immediately after it occurred, including another Amazon employee.
Two days after the alleged rape, Danbom told Amazon’s human resources department about her experience, and also several friends and her therapist.
Allegations against Amazon
Danbom told the New York Post that Amazon investigated the allegations, put Simonte on a monthslong leave of absence, but eventually decided that he did not violate its policy. The company said that Danbom’s account of what happened was “unfounded due to lack of evidence,” and amounted to a “he said, she said” situation, according to the filing.
Danbom accused Amazon of closing its investigation without speaking with witnesses who could corroborate her account and “without gathering evidence that was there for the asking,” the complaint stated.
The complaint alleged that during Amazon’s investigation, the company “asked inappropriate and re-traumatizing questions that suggested Laura did not do enough to stop the attack, including challenging Laura on whether she yelled ‘no’.”
“Before the rape began, she said no. No means no,” the suit added. “This is shameful questioning by a leading employer in 2024.”
The suit further claimed that the company said it would reopen the case if New York prosecutors brought charges against Simonte. The company also asked Danbom “not to speak about Simonte’s rape at work saying the allegation was ‘highly confidential,’” according to the filing.
“It prevented me from warning other women who might interact with him at events,” Danbom told the New York Post.
The filing claimed that Danbom was told that her role would not change at Amazon and that she would be required to “work with Simonte directly, by phone, by email and in remote meetings.”
“We take any allegation of this nature extremely seriously, and we have zero tolerance for workplace sexual misconduct or violence of any kind. We thoroughly investigate each report we receive and take appropriate action, up to and including termination, against those who are found to have violated our policies,” Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel said in a statement.
“We have robust policies and trained investigators in place to ensure each concern is heard and addressed with the proper care. While we don’t have more to share about the specifics of this pending litigation at this time, we continue to follow our rigorous processes and to hold all employees to the same high standards,” she added.
Danbom said that she took two leaves of absence after the incident. After as many as ten job applications within Amazon, she was transferred to a different position where she would not interact with Simonte back in 2024.
“It was really an escape,” she said. “The position was a lateral move. I was on a path for a promotion and had to walk away from that.”
The complaint is now seeking “lost wages, including front and backpay, lost bonuses and other benefits of employment, in an amount to be proven at trial.”
