BOSTON — A Massachusetts woman filed a class-action lawsuit Tuesday accusing Wal-Mart of wrongly denying employee benefits for same-sex spouses.

Jacqueline Cote says Wal-Mart repeatedly denied medical insurance for her wife before 2014, when the retail giant started offering benefits for same-sex spouses.

The couple incurred at least $150,000 in medical costs after Cote’s wife, Dee Smithson, was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2012.

The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Boston seeks damages for the couple and for any other Wal-Mart employees who weren’t offered insurance for their same-sex spouses. It asks for money to cover out-of-pocket medical costs and for other punitive damages.

Cote said in a call with reporters that the financial stress worsened Smithson’s suffering through cancer treatments. “I’m following through with this for my wife and actually for anyone else who has suffered a similar injustice,” Cote said.

Wal-Mart issued a statement Tuesday noting it expanded benefits last year to include same-sex spouses and domestic partners. “We have not yet seen the details of the lawsuit and out of respect for Ms. Cote we are not going to comment other than to say our benefits coverage previous to the 2014 update was consistent with the law.”

Cote, of New Bedford, previously took her case to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which decided in January that Wal-Mart’s denial amounted to discrimination and ordered the company to provide a “just resolution” for violating Cote’s civil rights.

In an interview, Cote said they “weren’t able to work it out.” The commission gave her permission to sue in May. The lawsuit, filed with the help of Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders and the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs, claims that hundreds or thousands of the company’s employees had been denied benefits before Wal-Mart offered insurance for same-sex spouses in 2014.

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