A lawsuit against Forest River brought by a man who says he was forced to quit because of age discrimination is back on track after a ruling by an Indiana circuit appeals court.
Sam Stamey says he worked for the RV maker for about 10 years before leaving in 2018 at age 62. His lawsuit alleges that Forest River constructively discharged him in violation of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act.
His resignation followed an alleged 10 months of insults, taunts and torments from coworkers because of his age, which he says didn’t stop despite complaints to supervisors and corporate officers. The behavior ranged from an estimated 1,000 insults including “Walmart Greeter” and “one foot in the grave” to crude graffiti and sabotage to his workstation, such as gluing his tool cabinet shut and tying his tools together, according to Stamey.
The company referred to the incidents as “horse play” in response to an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaint he later made, according to the lawsuit.
Forest River was granted summary judgment by the U.S. District Court of Northern Indiana, which concluded that Stamey couldn’t show that his working conditions were so intolerable that a reasonable person would have been compelled to resign. It also concluded that Stamey acted unreasonably in assuming that company management wouldn’t help him.
The court ruled that Stamey wasn’t constructively discharged because there was no “extraordinary condition here,” such as a threat of violence or “resounding silence in the face of myriad complaints.”
The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals recently reversed the decision, though it acknowledged that Stamey has a high hurdle to clear. The justices say it’s possible, based on what was presented in the lawsuit, that a jury could find the harassment he experienced was egregious enough to meet the threshold for an effective firing.
“If we credit his account that – in less than a year – his coworkers hurled upwards of 1,000 age-based insults at him without management taking effective steps to end the misconduct, a jury could return a verdict to Stamey’s favor,” the majority opinion states. “On the other hand, if Forest River shows that Stamey’s account lacks credibility, the company may prevail. Our role is not to weigh evidence or resolve factual disputes – it is up to the jury to decide.”
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