Female Officer Wins Promotion In Settlement

Female Officer Wins Promotion In Settlement
Stamford lieutenant charged bias in administration of captain’s test
By CHRISTIAN NOLAN
Elizabeth Erickson v. City of Stamford: A female police officer of 24 years who sued the city of Stamford for discrimination after she was passed over for a possible promotion to captain has reached a settlement that includes the promotion.
Elizabeth Erickson accused ranking police officials of changing testing procedures in 2005 as a means to block her promotion. She filed a federal lawsuit in 2008.
Now Erickson and the police department have reached a settlement that will promote the longtime officer from lieutenant to captain and also pay her $175,000 to cover attorney fees and other litigation costs, said her lawyer, Kathryn Emmett of Emmett & Glander in Stamford.
“It’s really beneficial to the Stamford Police Department to have a person of her ability, commitment and intelligence in a high ranking position in the department,” said Emmett. “We’re very happy we were able to resolve [the lawsuit] with her being able to be promoted to captain.”
Erickson was sworn in as a Stamford police officer in 1988. Eight years later, after receiving the top score on a promotional exam, she was promoted to sergeant. In 2001, she again got the top score on a promotional test, and was elevated to lieutenant.
According to court documents, Erickson always received excellent performance reviews. So Erickson took the captain’s test in 2005.
According to Erickson’s complaint, while she was studying for the written exam, then-Chief Brent Larrabee asked her why she was studying since “we already have a female captain.” Larrabee, now interim chief in East Haven in the wake of the town’s racial profiling scandal, admitted during a deposition that he made the comment about female captains, but he said he was joking.
At the time, there were 218 officers employed by the Stamford Police Department. Of those, 18 were female. Of 50 sergeants, three were female. Of the dozen lieutenants, only Erickson was female.
Not surprisingly, given her testing history, Erickson again gained the top score on the written captain’s exam. The two other officers taking the exam were white males who finished second and third.
Typically, according to the complaint, the top scorer on the test is not passed over for promotion unless he or she has some sort of disciplinary record. However, at a meeting of the city’s Police Commission, the second-place finisher on the written test was chosen for promotion to captain.
According to the complaint, the Police Commission added an oral exam to the testing criteria even though the initial promotional exam announcement said the written exam would make up 100 percent of the evaluation. The Police Commission claims to have scored the oral examination, but those scores were never preserved, according to court records.
“The Commission never followed such a procedure in connection with a promotional decision — either before or since — and used this procedure in plaintiff’s case as a pretext for discrimination — i.e., as a rationale for not appointing her even though she was fully qualified to be promoted to captain,” Emmett wrote in the complaint.
Then-Chief Larrabee later told Erickson she lacked enough patrol experience. Erickson also claims that in other conversations, Larrabee told her the department had a problem with women and she needed more supervision experience “so the men would respect her.”
Attorneys for the City of Stamford have maintained that the second-place finisher on the written exam was the better overall candidate for promotion to captain at that time.
According to court documents, Erickson also endured sexual harassment; those accusations were initially part of her lawsuit but were later dropped. Erickson claimed she was the subject of vulgar comments by male officers in an anonymously written police department bulletin called “The Patrolman’s Perspective.”
“What a colossal waste of a badge,” wrote an officer. “You haven’t been a cop since you put that uniform on and I don’t give a damn if they put stars on your collar before it’s over. Are you crying right now?” the comment continued. “Good. F--- you.”
In the complaint, attorney Emmett said nothing was done about the comments and when Lt. Erickson complained to the chief about them, he allegedly told her “there is a lot of underlying truth in them.”
In September 2007, Erickson filed a complaint with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities alleging employment discrimination. Then, in 2008, she filed a federal lawsuit alleging employment discrimination.
After a lengthy discovery process with numerous depositions, the two sides came to a settlement rather than go to trial this spring.
“In settling the case, both parties agreed that the city admits to no liability for any discriminatory acts,” Micheal Toma, a city attorney in Stamford, said in an e-mailed statement. “The city disputes that discrimination played a part in the promotional process that is the subject of Erickson’s complaint. The parties settled the case rather than go to trial because they recognized that juries are unpredictable.”
Assisting Toma in defending the city in the case were attorneys James M. Sconzo and Michael G. Petrie, both of the Jorden Burt firm in Simsbury.
In addition to her promotion, Erickson originally sought back pay at the captain’s wage scale, as well as punitive damages. She settled for $175,000 in attorney fees and other litigation costs. The settlement was approved by U.S. Magistrate Judge William I. Garfinkel.
Emmett noted that continuing the litigation, considering the number of depositions taken and the cost of expert witnesses, would have been expensive.
“I think both parties worked hard to reach a fair and reasonable settlement,” said Emmett. “Now everyone is going forward with a positive outlook.”•