City director harassed by boss's sex texts wins £64,000

Chief executive Guy Oppenheim bombarded Nadine Nassar with suggestive text messages and late-night phone calls and pestered her for dates.

Mr Oppenheim, 53, also told Miss Nassar, 36, he had marital problems, said she reminded him of Kate Winslet and encouraged her to join him in Kabbalah sessions.

She spurned his advances and was sacked in April last year from her £136,000-a-year post at the London arm of Geneva's Notz Stucki - one of Europe's largest asset management firms.

One of Mr Oppenheim's texts read: "I was watching a movie yesterday with Kate Winslet. It is funny - you remind me of her." Others said "I was walking in the park thinking of you" and "Je t'embrasse" .

Giving evidence to the central London employment tribunal, Mr Oppenheim tried to explain the messages as an attempt to help Miss Nassar settle into her new job and life in London. He claimed he was seeking friendship rather than a sexual relationship.

But the tribunal ruled that there was a "sexual dimension" to his overtures. It said Mr Oppenheim's behaviour amounted to sexual harassment but that Miss Nassar's case was brought too late under sex discrimination laws to be successful. The tribunal ruled that she was unfairly dismissed.

In its judgment, it said of Mr Oppenheim's communications: "We did not accept that these were purely for business purposes. We were satisfied by Miss Nassar's evidence that they were indeed unwanted. We were also satisfied that she found them intimidating."

Miss Nassar, of Chelsea, told the tribunal Mr Oppenheim made advances in 2006 before she joined the firm as a private client director. She said: "I felt that if I just let them pass, he would get the message soon enough and drop them."

Miss Nassar said Mr Oppenheim became "even more persistent" once she moved to the firm's Mayfair office in January 2007. She made a formal complaint about his behaviour in late Marchlast year and he fired her days later.