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Jury awards $7.7 million in wrongful firing case By TIM MCGLONE, The Virginian-Pilot NORFOLK — A federal jury awarded $7.7 million to a former employee of a time share sales company after finding that the woman was fired for filing a discrimination complaint, her attorney announced Wednesday. Pamela L. DePaoli of Virginia Beach was able to show that her bosses at Vacation Sales Associates fired her in retaliation for filing age and gender discrimination complaints with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. After a five-day trial in U.S. District Court, the jury Tuesday afternoon awarded DePaoli $2.5 million in compensatory damages, $5 million in punitive damages and $200,000 in back pay. Company attorneys have already alerted the court that it will seek to nullify the jury’s verdict or reduce the award. DePaoli said Wednesday that she is overwhelmed by the jury’s decision. “It just proves that someone such as myself can prevail against a large corporation,” she said. “I hope this will make them stop.” DePaoli’s attorney said he believes the jury’s award is the largest ever in a wrongful termination claim in the Norfolk federal court. “I told them you need to award an amount that’s going to give people notice,” said the attorney, John Loeschen of Roanoke. Vacation Sales Associate attorney William E. Rachels Jr. of Norfolk expressed bewilderment. “We believe the jury’s verdict was unwarranted,” he said Wednesday. The monetary award, he said, “was beyond anything supported by the evidence.” DePaoli, 49, sold time shares at the Virginia Beach Oceanfront for Vacation Sales Associates from 1997 until she was fired in summer 2003. Court records show that she was among the top salespe ople, bringing in $2 million a year in sales in 2001 and 2002. She earned commissions of 5 percent, or about $100,000 annually. Between 2001 and 2003, DePaoli was passed over for promotion at least three times; each time a man was given the job instead and at least once it was someone with less experience, according to ruling earlier in the case by District Judge Raymond A. Jackson. When DePaoli complained about being passed over, company executives began barraging her with inappropriate age and gender comments, the judge determined in a ruling that sent the case to trial. A company executive told DePaoli early in 2002 “that she could leave the company if she did not like the existing state of affairs,” the judge wrote. In 2003, after filing a complaint with the employment commission, the harassment escalated, he wrote. Former employees who testified corroborated DePaoli’s story and one employee testified that management falsified DePaoli’s sales figures to make it look like she was not performing well. Rachels said no evidence was presented to back up that claim. He said DePaoli was terminated in 2003 after her sales figures plummeted, not in retaliation for filing discrimination complaints. DePaoli said she understands she may not recover the full amount and she is not making any long-term plans. She thanked her attorney, saying “no one else would take the case,” and she thanked the jury. Vacation Sales Associates is a subsidiary of The Breeden Co ., based on Lynnhaven Parkway, Virginia Beach. A message left with the company was not returned. A receptionist said company executives were not in the office Wednesday.
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