Opinion ID: 167100
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Burlington history and pattern of age discrimination

Text: 55 Finally, Pippin argues a jury could infer pretext because Burlington has a long history of preventing Senior Engineers from retiring, and statistical evidence reveals a pattern of age discrimination. 56 However, Pippin has presented no reliable evidence on these points. First, as for the history of preventing retirements, Pippin relies on his own deposition testimony and the testimony of Kenneth Raybon. Raybon, who is not an engineer, was a production superintendent with Burlington but was demoted to senior supervisor in May 2000. The testimony Pippin relies on from Raybon is as follows: 57 Q. Have you ever seen a senior engineer retire at Burlington? 58 A. A senior engineer retire? 59 Q. Yes. 60 A. I can only remember, I guess, going back to ancient history maybe early `90s. I can only remember one engineer retiring, and I'm not even sure what his classification was.... 61 Q. What happens to all these engineers? It seems like the place is filled with them, and none of them retire. Why is that? 62 A. I think for the most part, they're probably not of retirement age. 63 Q. At least, not the ones that continue to be employed here, right? 64 A. I can't think of one who is 55 years or older, as we speak. 65 Q. Can you think of any who have gotten terminated besides Mr. Pippin who are approaching that age? 66 A. No, sir. 67 However, absent information about what happened to the other senior engineers— whether they were promoted to other positions or terminated to avoid retirement— this weak evidence does not support an inference that Defendant's stated reasons for termination were pretextual. 68 Similarly, Pippin's allegation of a statistical pattern of age discrimination— apparently inferred from the fact that fourteen of the nineteen employees terminated in the 2000 RIF were over forty—is not supported by the record. 12 Statistical evidence which fails to properly take into account nondiscriminatory explanations does not permit an inference of pretext. Furr, 82 F.3d at 987. A plaintiff's statistical evidence must focus on eliminating nondiscriminatory explanations for the disparate treatment by showing disparate treatment between comparable individuals. Rea, 29 F.3d at 1456 (quotation omitted). Statistical evidence that does not adjust for the various performance evaluations and departmental rankings of the employees included in the statistical pool does not compare similarly situated employees and therefore fails to eliminate nondiscriminatory explanations for disparate treatment. Id. 69 In this case, Pippin's statistical evidence that fourteen out of nineteen RIF-terminated employees were over forty does not account for any of these different individuals' circumstances, skills, or prior performances. It represents only a very small sample size, cf. Mayor of Philadelphia v. Educational Equality League, 415 U.S. 605, 621, 94 S.Ct. 1323, 39 L.Ed.2d 630 (1974) (noting concern with sample size of thirteen), and it fails to tell us what portion of the overall Burlington workforce was over forty in order to compare whether 14/19 is an excessive percentage of over-forty terminations. See Stone v. Autoliv ASP, Inc., 210 F.3d 1132, 1139 (10th Cir. 2000) ([S]tatistics concerning employees terminated in a RIF are probative to the extent they suggest that [protected classes of employees] were not treated less favorably than [the privileged classes].). 4. Conclusion 70 Taking all of this together, we agree with the district court that Pippin has not presented sufficient evidence to support an inference of pretext. The RIF was implemented consistently, and Pippin has presented no evidence of a history of discrimination or a discriminatory intent in terminating Pipping. Accordingly, we affirm the district court. 71