Monday, December 10, 2012

Veronese v. Lucasfilm (Cal. Ct. App. - Dec. 10, 2012)

Let's be glad that George Lucas is better at making movies than he is at the day-to-day running of his business.

It's not shocking at all that Lucasfilm gets spanked for pregnancy discrimation here.  Including an attorney's fees award of over a million dollars.  Yes, I know we're "mellow" and "hip" in Marin, and do things differently.  But the "concerns" expressed here -- as well as the questions that were asked -- are so clearly close to (and in some cases over) the line that there should have been a thousand red flags raised.  But it was instead the managers at Lucasfilm who were making all the errors.

The Court of Appeal ultimately reverses the jury's award for instructional error.  So Lucasfilm's incompetence gets saved -- at least temporarily -- by the trial judge's incompetence in numerous (fairly straightforward) instrutional errors.  So off we are to a retrial.

I'm all for being interacting with people as "people".  Particularly in occupational settings that are, as here, relational.

But some things go to far.  There's no way defendants would have had the same attitude displayed here if the issue involved race.  Taking an infinitely more "relaxed" view because it's pregnancy rather than racial discrimiation is neither justified nor an especially good idea.