A U.S. District Court judge in Virginia dismissed a $5 million civil lawsuit last month against the $21.3 billion Pentagon Federal Credit Union because the allegations of sexual harassment, a hostile work environment, retaliation, age discrimination and wrongful discharge, were not backed up by sufficient facts from the former employee who claimed them.
In January, Celia Coleman, 55, of Brandywine, Md., a 31-year former employee, filed the civil suit against PenFed. The lawsuit alleged that a woman supervisor sexually demeaned and assaulted Coleman repeatedly. The lawsuit also charged that the other three female employees encouraged and condoned the sexual harassment and they targeted Coleman for termination.
“Accordingly, plaintiff (Coleman) has not pleaded sufficient facts to show that there was any harassing conduct, let alone that it was severe or pervasive,” U.S. District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema in Alexandria, Va., wrote in a 12-page ruling released on March 17.
Even though Coleman filed a complaint with her supervisor about being discriminated and targeted by another employee, Coleman did not provide information about alleged specific incidents of such conduct, Judge Brinkema noted in the ruling.
“Plaintiff (Coleman) has alleged precisely one incident of unwelcome conduct related to her age — the comment that she had “gray hair” and was “too old to work at PenFed,” Judge Brinkema wrote. “Such a comment falls short of ‘pervasive’ or ‘severe’ abuse. It also fails because there is not a time frame provided.”
The federal judge also dismissed Coleman’s wrongful discharge claim saying that she alleged a “fraudulent scheme in ominous but highly generalized terms as a plot” to prevent Coleman from drawing a higher pension, but did not identify with specificity any fraudulent statements or representations by PenFed management.
PenFed declined to comment on the judge’s ruling when contacted Monday.
