Microsoft intern’s claims highlight struggle to combat sex bias

A Microsoft logo is seen in Los Angeles, California U.S. November 7, 2017. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson

The woman was an intern when her Microsoft colleagues took her out for drinks in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighbourhood. She lived miles away in Redmond, the home to Microsoft’s suburban campus, so after a night of drinking, she crashed with a male intern and his friend who lived in a group house nearby. She fell asleep in the basement, while the other intern and his friend played guitar. 

But during the night, her lawyer would later write to Microsoft, the male intern sexually assaulted her – or “forcibly penetrated her while she was sleeping,” according to her lawyer’s letter. When she woke, naked and with just flashes of memory, she rushed to the hospital for a rape exam and later filed a police report. She reported the incident to her supervisor at Microsoft as well as the company’s human resources department, which promised a prompt investigation.