Lore v. City of Syracuse, et al.

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The City appealed from a district court order requiring it to pay plaintiff damages, attorneys' fees, and costs for retaliation against her in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. 2000e et seq., and state law, for making complaints of gender discrimination. Plaintiff cross-appealed, principally challenging the dismissal of her retaliation claims against individual defendants and denying her additional damages and attorneys' fees. The court concluded that the City's appeal provided no basis for overturning the judgment against the City. The court also concluded that plaintiff's cross-appeal merited only in its challenges to (A) the dismissal, on qualified immunity grounds, of her New York State Human Rights Law (HRL), N.Y.Exec. Law 296 et seq., claim against defendant Rick Guy, and (B) the grant of summary judgment dismissing her main discrimination claims under the HRL against the City and defendant Roy Bernardi, and that plaintiff was entitled to trial of those discrimination claims. The court held, however, that a trial of the erroneously dismissed HRL discrimination claims alone could lead to an award of damages that would be duplicative, in whole or in part, or the compensation plaintiff was awarded in the present judgment. Accordingly, the court concluded that if there was to be a trial of the HRL discrimination claims, that trial must be combined with a retrial of plaintiff's Title VII and HRL retaliation claims against the City and her HRL retaliation claim against Guy.