Indy | Judge orders age bias lawsuit to April trial; case offers rare look at how GCI engineers layoffs

In an eye-opening decision, a U.S. district court judge has brushed aside Gannett’s attempts to dismiss a former Indianapolis Star columnist’s age-discrimination lawsuit, ordering that her suit move to a jury trial this spring.

The case offers a rare inside look at how GCI has engineered thousands of company-wide layoffs in recent years -- including the single-largest, more than 2,000, in December 2008. What’s more, it could serve as a legal road map for other laid-off employees who also think they were victims of age discrimination.

Judge Richard Young didn’t rule on the central allegation made by the columnist, Susan Guyett, who was 59 when she was let go that December 2008. She was replaced by a co-worker who had less seniority and was 20 years younger. Indeed, Young noted that several of the 20 employees targeted that month were younger than Guyett.

But Young questioned what he called Editor Dennis Ryerson’s contradictory rationale for how he chose those to be laid off. And he suggested Ryerson had designed the reduction in force (RIF) to protect less-senior workers -- including three working for the Metromix entertainment site whose ages ranged from 25 to 31.

“Ryerson’s continuous narrowing of departments into subdepartments in order to spare less senior reporters from the RIF is evidence of pretext,’’ Young wrote in his 17-page order. “In other words, the Metromix reporters may not have been exempt from the RIF because their department was excluded, but rather were exempt due to Ryerson’s desire to retain young reporters for Metromix.”

‘Pretext for sparing young reporters’
Just two days after Guyett was laid off, Ryerson replaced her with Cathy Kightlinger, 39, who was transferred to the My Life features department from the community news department, and assigned to take over Guyett’s column.

“Ryerson’s explanation for protecting hard news reporters from the RIF,” the judge said, “contradicts his decision to remove Kightlinger from Community News to replace Plaintiff. Additionally, his decision to spare the Metromix reporters because Metromix is a subdepartment of the My Life department suggests a pretext for sparing young reporters from the RIF.”

Young unsealed his order on Tuesday after initially shielding it from public view when he signed it Dec. 22, according to Guyett’s attorney, Kathleen DeLaney of DeLaney & Delaney in Indianapolis.

Guyett filed her suit in April 2010 in federal court in Indianapolis, after the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission gave its support for her to sue. She brought her complaint to the commission in May 2009 after her dismissal in December 2008.

Guyett first worked for GCI at an unidentified New Year newspaper in 1978-79, then left the field until she returned in 1999 as a freelance writer at the Star, and then a full-time reporter the following year for the column, “Talk of Our Town.” She was covered by a Newspaper Guild contract that mandated layoffs based on seniority, except under certain limited circumstances.

In November 2007, Guyett got an overall annual performance rating of “three or higher,” Young said, “meaning that her job performance was meeting or exceeding the Star’s expectations.”

Letter: Guyett’s job ‘eliminated’
But a year later, she was chosen to be laid off, and was given a letter saying her job had been “eliminated,” Young said.

Kightlinger was quickly assigned to Guyett’s column. She had received the same overall rating as Guyett on her recent performance appraisal, Young said.

Yet, replacing Guyett with Kightlinger, Young said, "indicates that the news reporters were not indispensable, as Ryerson claimed, and casts doubt on the legitimacy of the Star’s stated reason for [Guyett’s] termination versus reporters in the hard news department with less seniority.”

Barring a settlement or other new developments, the case is scheduled to go to trial on April 24, attorney DeLaney said in a news release.

Earlier: In Gannett's TV business, why 40 isn't the new 20.

Do you think your layoff constituted age discrimination? Have you considered suing the company? Why -- or why not? Please post your replies in the comments section, below. To e-mail confidentially, write jimhopkins[at]gmail[dot-com]; see Tipsters Anonymous Policy in the rail, upper right.