The Force is Sometimes Against Us

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EmpBlog-5.13.2013-DarthJulie Gilman Veronese sued Lucasfilm Ltd. in 2009 after she was hired—and then fired—as an assistant to the estate manager at George Lucas’s San Anselmo estate.  She claimed she was fired because she was pregnant.  Lucasfilm denied the allegations and submitted evidence that she was “entitled”.  And so it began…

And it still isn’t over yet.  After winning a verdict of $113,830 in damages and $1.2 million in attorneys’ fees (yes, you read that correctly; the attorneys’ fees award was over 10 times the amount of the damages award—now you know why there are so many plaintiffs’ attorneys!), Veronese lost at the appellate court level and the California Supreme Court recently declined to hear her case.  The case will now likely be retried in Marin Superior Court.

The appeal largely turned on the trial court’s refusal to give a jury instruction on business judgment to the effect that Lucasfilm could make a wrong or unfair decision so long as it was not “motivated by discrimination or retaliation related to her being pregnant.”  In declining to give the instruction, the trial court committed reversible error.

While the facts of the case generated some media attention due to the involvement of Lucasfilm, the more interesting issue is the business judgment instruction viewed in the context of modern trial tactics.  If possible, plaintiffs lawyers will attempt to have juries second guess business decisions, rather than focus solely on the issue of whether discrimination occurred.  This is legally incorrect and unfair; not only is hindsight 20-20 , but the jury system is not designed as a check against ordinary management choices.  Nevertheless, this strategy is likely to continue to be used until jury instructions like the one sought by Lucasfilm become standard.

This blog is presented under protest by the law firm of Ervin Cohen & Jessup LLP.  It is essentially the random thoughts and opinions of someone who lives in the trenches of the war that often is employment law–he/she may well be a little shell-shocked.  So if you are thinking “woohoo, I just landed some free legal advice that will fix all my problems!”, think again.  This is commentary people, a sketchy overview of some current legal issue with a dose of humor, but commentary nonetheless; as if Dennis Miller were a lawyer…and still mildly amusing.  No legal advice here; you would have to pay real US currency for that (unless you are my mom, and even then there are limits).  But feel free to contact us with your questions and comments—who knows, we might even answer you.  And if you want to spread this stuff around, feel free to do so, but please keep it in its present form (‘cause you can’t mess with this kind of poetry).  Big news: Copyright 2013.  All rights reserved; yep, all of them.

If you have any questions about this article, contact the writer directly, assuming he or she was brave enough to attach their name to it.  If you have any questions regarding this blog or your life in general, contact Kelly O. Scott, Esq., commander in chief of this blog and Head Honcho (official legal title) of ECJ’s Employment Law Department, at (310) 281-6348 or kscott@ecjlaw.com.

DISCLAIMER: Because of the generality of this update, the information provided herein may not be applicable in all situations and should not be acted upon without specific legal advice based on particular situations.

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