Former Detroit Pistons employee sues team, former exec for alleged sexual harassment

A former Detroit Pistons employee is suing the team and a former assistant general manager in federal court for alleged sexual harassment and "brutally assaulting" her during her tenure with the team.

Attorneys from the Royal Oak-based law firm of Pitt, McGehee, Palmer, Bonanni & Rivers filed a civil rights lawsuit Friday in Detroit U.S. District Court on behalf of DeJanai Raska, a former employee, and argued she also suffered assault and battery around November 2021. The Detroit Pistons Organization and Robert Murphy, the team's fired assistant general manager, were named as defendants, court records showed.

Raska, 32, who served as Murphy's executive assistant from September 2021 to June 2023, is seeking "an amount she is found to be entitled to" in punitive damages for past and present emotional suffering stemming from the alleged sexual harassment and assault she suffered. The organization was accused of tolerating and enabling a "sexually hostile workplace" that resulted in her departure, the suit said.

The suit accused Murphy of falsely telling the human resources department that Raska had resigned when he had actually fired her.

Murphy's attorneys and the Pistons couldn't immediately be reached on Friday. Raska's attorneys also couldn't be reached for comment.

Although initially placed on administrative leave in October 2022, Murphy was later fired nearly seven months later on May 4, the organization announced, citing "violation of company policy and the terms of his employment agreement." At the time, Raska's law firm had notified the team that it intended to sue on her behalf. The lawsuit accuses the Pistons of enabling sexual harassment by not moving to dismiss Murphy prior to the May notice to sue.

Raska's experience with Murphy and the Pistons was described as an "unfortunate but all too familiar story of the ongoing inability of professional athletic organizations to provide a safe workplace for women."

"Ms. Raska endured unrelenting harassment by Murphy, ranging from sexual comments about her body, to flaunting of his alleged sexual proclivity and past conquests, to pointing at his erect penis and telling Raska that 'she did this to him,'" the suit said.

"Murphy groped and grabbed her buttocks and breasts, declaring 'this is gonna be all mine,' and announced he wanted to put a baby inside of her. On one occasion, Murphy forced himself on top of Ms. Raska, held her down, and when she tried to pull away, he told her, 'You need to get out of your head. You think too much,'" according to the lawsuit.

At the time, Murphy was the senior player liaison for the Pistons and the general manager and president of the Motor City Cruise, a Pistons minor league affiliate.

Murphy also was accused of retaliating against Raska for refusing his sexual advances by assigning her to pick up his son from school and caring for him, while Murphy distributed most of her executive assistant “administrative duties and operations” described in Raska’s contract to other staff, the suit said.

"At no time did Murphy allow, train, or instruct Raska to perform the full duties that he hired her for," according to the litigation.

Murphy, represented by attorneys from the law firm of Potter, DeAgostino, O'Dea & Clark, in May denied Raska's claims and argued that Murphy had passed a polygraph test administered by the president of Michigan Association of Polygraph Examiners in November 2022, and "he fully cooperated with the Pistons’ investigation conducted by outside counsel."

Murphy, a Detroit native, was promoted to assistant general manager of the Pistons and president of the Motor City Cruise in March 2021. He spent the prior 20 years as a college basketball coach, which included 10 years as the head coach at Eastern Michigan, until he joined the Pistons as a senior director of player personnel in 2021.

jaimery@detroitnews.com