A former news anchor and a former creative services director who were laid off from Nexstar-owned KSEE were told to amend their claims against the station group, after the two sued for age discrimination.
Courthouse News Service reports Faith Sidlow and Richard Nitido, who are both over 40, “failed to prove that the television company discriminated against them because of their age, U.S. District Judge Troy Nunley ruled on March 10.”
Nexstar laid her off in 2013, claiming it needed to reduce costs and increase profits.
AdvertisementSidlow claims she was not offered a severance commensurate with company policy.
Nitido claimed he was recruited away from Disney-owned KFSN, where he had worked for 26 years, to work for Nexstar as a creative services director.
Nexstar let him go after a year.Both plaintiffs claimed that “the procedure used to select employees for layoff had a disparate impact on older workers. Almost all of the employees selected for layoff were over the age of 40.”
But Judge Nunley found that Sidlow and Nitido did not show that the station intentionally discriminated against them because of their age.
“Plaintiffs simply point to a policy that has an allegedly disparate impact on employees over the age of 40. Plaintiffs do not provide sufficient facts to support their allegation that age was a substantial motivating reason for defendants’ conduct in terminating plaintiffs or that defendant intended to discriminate against this protected class,” Nunley wrote.
He gave them 30 days to amend their disparate treatment claims