A Waterloo nurse who was fired after showing colleagues a tattoo on her butt and a picture of her boyfriend’s genital piercing has been denied unemployment benefits, according to the Waterloo Cedar Falls Courier. Laura Williams was fired by MercyOne Waterloo Medical Center on April 24th for violating the company’s sexual harassment policies. Williams says that she was having a private conversation with two colleagues with no patients present about her boyfriend’s genital piercing and that he was in the process of giving her a tattoo on her rear end. One of her colleagues asked to see the tattoo and the piercing so Williams pulled down her pants to show them the progress and produced a picture on her phone of the piercing. One of the colleagues then reported the incident to hospital management, which led to Williams’ firing. Williams applied for unemployment benefits but at the hearing the judge concluded that Williams’ conduct amounted to “willful or wanton disregard of the employer’s interest” and represented a “deliberate violation or disregard of standards of behavior which the employer has the right to expect of employees.”
