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Age discrimination lawsuit dismissed after applicant failed to show employer?s reason for rejection were pretext to mask unlawful discrimination

Age discrimination lawsuit dismissed after applicant failed to show employer?s reason for rejection were pretext to mask acts of unlawful discrimination
Saia v Suffolk County Community Coll., 2009 NY Slip Op 05851, decided on July 14, 2009, Appellate Division, Second Department

Robert Saia sued the Suffolk County Community College in an attempt to obtain damages. Saia alleged that the College had unlawfully discriminated against him in employment because of his age in violation of Executive Law §296 when it declined to appoint him as a full-time professor at the College.

Supreme Court, Suffolk County Judge Robert W. Doyle granted the Community College?s motion for summary judgment, dismissing Saia?s complaint.

Affirming the lower court?s determination, the Appellate Division ruled that the College had met its prima facie burden of establishing that its decision not to appoint the Saia to its faculty as a full-time professor was based on legitimate, nondiscriminatory reasons, and not his age.

As the result of the College?s established a non-discriminatory bona fide reason for its decision, the burden of going forward then shifted to Saia.

Accordingly, Saia was now required to demonstrate that the reasons offered by the College in support of its action were merely a pretext for unlawful discrimination and that his age was the true reason for the College?s decision not to appoint him to the position.

The Appellate Division determined that Saia failed to meet his burden of going forward, holding that Saia ?failed to raise a triable issue of fact as to whether the reasons proffered by the College were pretextual? and dismissed his appeal.

The decision is posted on the Internet at:
http://www.courts.state.ny.us/reporter/3dseries/2009/2009_05851.htm

Full post as published by New York Public Personnel Law on July 24, 2009 (boomark / email).