State Supreme Court rejects TEAM’s petitionLu Ann Hurd-LofPark Rapids Enterprise - 10/23/2007
The Minnesota Supreme Court has denied a petition to overturn the Court of Appeals ruling in the age discrimination case brought by Edward LaBonte against TEAM Industries, Park Rapids.
The Court of Appeals upheld Judge Jay D. Mondry’s decision in the case July 24. TEAM filed a petition to the Supreme Court a month later.
According to Stephen Cooper, Minneapolis, LaBonte’s attorney, the Supreme Court rarely grants a petition. TEAM’s appeals are now exhausted.
LaBonte is entitled to front and back pay of $254,250 plus attorney’s fees first awarded following a court trial that started in June 2005.
Interest will be accruing against TEAM if it delays payment, according to Cooper.
Cooper, a former Minnesota Human Rights Commissioner, said Monday, “In outstate Minnesota there are not many verdicts of this magnitude the last several years. In Hennepin County, there are a lot more.”
Mondry had found in favor of LaBonte in February 2005. A month later TEAM filed a motion for a new trial and Mondry denied the motion.
TEAM’s subsequent appeal challenged all aspects of the case from the award of pay to whether or not LaBonte’s layoff was justified.
LaBonte was employed as a machine operator for approximately five years and was 60 at the time of layoffs at the Park Rapids plant April 7, 2003. Of 32 people terminated at that time, 21 were 40 years old or older. One expert, who testified during the trial, said the odds of an employee being terminated increased along with the employee’s age.
In addition, the court record states that while approximately 67 percent of the county’s available workforce is over age 40, only 44 percent of TEAM’s workers were in the over 40 group, even prior to the terminations.
TEAM claimed the layoffs were nondiscriminatory and were necessary due to a work slowdown. Further, TEAM claimed LaBonte’s efforts to find another job were less than adequate so he should not have been awarded front and back pay.
Mondry ruled that LaBonte was not required to take any position that was offered. “Finding suitable employment in Park Rapids cannot be compared to finding employment in the Twin Cities,” Mondry determined. He also ruled that TEAM provided no evidence that LaBonte turned down positions or hesitated to secure subsequent employment.
Affirming Mondry’s decision, the Appeals Court decision disagrees with TEAM’s assertion that LaBonte did not conduct a reasonable job search. “Although TEAM argues that LaBonte should have secured new employment within two months, the district court is in the best position to evaluate the local job opportunities for a person in LaBonte’s situation,” wrote Appeals Court Judge Thomas J. Kalitowski.
Age discrimination claims under the Minnesota Human Rights Act can be proven by either “disparate treatment” or “disparate impact.”
In the appeal, TEAM Industries argued the district court wrongly found in favor of LaBonte by concluding both theories were proved.
Cooper said the terms are simpler to explain than they sound.
According to Cooper, disparate treatment means the employer intended to discriminate.
TEAM’s arguments relied on use of a “forced-ranking evaluation tool,” the employer used to determine who would be laid off in 2003.
Kalitowski states, “Here, statistical evidence indicates that the forced-ranking tool upon which appellant (TEAM) relied produced disparate results depending on the age of the person to whom it was applied. And the record indicates that appellant manipulated rankings of three employees on the list, resulting in lower rankings for the remaining employees.”
Disparate impact, Cooper explained, means an employer may not have intended to discriminate but that was a result. For example, Cooper said, if an employer said they would only hire people who are 6 feet tall, that would have an impact on women. The employer might say employees need to be 6 feet tall because they have to reach things taller than that.
In the LaBonte case, however, the Appeals Court judge states, “Evidence at trial indicated that the forced-ranking tool here is not directly related to an employee’s ability to perform the job effectively. According to performance reviews, LaBonte was performing the job effectively at the time his employment was terminated.
“Instead, there is evidence in the record that the tool was applied subjectively and inconsistently, returning different results based on the person performing the rating, and was susceptible to adjustments to correct for disfavored outcomes,” Kalitowski wrote.
“In this case, the tool they invented couldn’t justify what they did. They did discriminate and there was no excuse for it,” Cooper said. “Their justification had no validity.”
“The main thing this decision (from the Court of Appeals) says is it is unfortunate this employer has not chosen to correct the problem, but pretended the problem did not exist,” Cooper said.
“Employers can’t discard older workers,” Cooper said.
luannh@parkrapidsenterprise.com
