A $13 million award for a former UCLA professor was reversed as a three-judge appeals court panel called out a lower court’s ruling in her gender discrimination case.
Judges Maria E. Stratton, Elizabeth A. Grimes, and Shepard Wiley, Jr. of the Court of Appeals for California’s Second Appellate District Division Eight reversed the ruling in favor of Lauren Pinter-Brown, who claimed she suffered gender discriminationwhile professor of medicine for UCLA
“Unfortunately, the trial court committed a series of grave errors that significantly prejudiced The Regents [of the University of California’s]’ right to a fair trial by an impartial judge,” wrote Judge Stratton.
Judge Shepard Wiley
| California Courts
The appeals court ruled that the lower court shouldn’t have pointed to civil rights icons, including telling the jury they should “stand in the shoes of Dr. Martin Luther King and bend the arc of the moral universe toward justice,” according to the opinion.
The lower court also erred when details of other discrimination complaints against the university became a topic of conversation during the trial, even though those weren’t related to Pinter-Brown’s allegations.
The appeals court went on to disagree with the trial court’s decision to permit the jury to rely on the "Moreno Report," an analysis of racial discrimination on school grounds written by a retired Supreme Court justice.
“These errors were cumulative and highly prejudicial. The evidence the trial court’s inability to remain impartial and created the impression that the court was partial to Dr. Pinter-Brown’s claims,” wrote Judge Stratton.
Ultimately, the judges determined that the evidence did, in fact, show that Pinter-Brown experienced some type of adverse treatment from her bosses, and UCLA’s argument that it was nothing more than personality differences fell short with the appeals court. At the same time, Pinter-Brown failed to serve a response to audit reports and actually didn’t believe that what she experienced was because of her gender. The appeals court also pointed out that two jurors actually sided with UCLA, so the award should reflect that.
Pinter-Brown alleged in her testimony that some of the discrimination included being called by her first name, while male doctors were referenced by their last names. She was allegedly told to move seats in a clinic because her supervisor said he wanted a male to sit there. She also claimed she was instructed not to “boss the guys around.”