TBN Employment Discrimination Suit Settled (Complaints/Cross-Complaints Included): Senior Workers "Too Old, Too Sick and Too Lazy"

http://taxdollars.ocregister.com/2012/05/31/tbn-suit-senior-workers-too-old-too-sick-and-too-lazy/155774/

TBN suit: Senior workers ‘too old, too sick, and too lazy’

One could argue that the current tumult at Trinity Broadcasting Network came to light in the wake of one Horst Brandt.

Brandt, a man of German descent who oversaw the TV ministry’s computer systems, filed a lawsuit one year ago against Trinity Christian Center of Santa Ana, Paul Crouch Jr., and his daughter, Brittany Koper, who was then head of human resources.

In addition to hiring Brandt as an independent contractor rather than a regular employee (which is cheaper for TBN), and in addition to slurs referencing Brandt’s national origin (“Horst runs his department like Nazi Germany during World War II”), the suit maintains that Trinity fired Brandt because he was getting long in the tooth.

“During the last year of Brandt’s employment, CEO Paul Crouch Jr. and HR Director Brittany Koper, made repeated discriminatory remarks about older workers,” Brandt’s complaint says. “For example, in the meeting at which he informed Brandt that he would be fired, Crouch Jr. commented that Paul Crouch, Sr. and Ruth Brown were ‘getting up there in age too’….

“Crouch Jr. also stated to a vendor (after firing Brandt) that ‘there are some older people here and it is time for a change.” Crouch JR. told another vendor that Chief Financial Officer Ruth Brown, ‘is getting up there in age and should find something else to do.’

Ruth Brown is the sister of the network’s founder, Paul Crouch Sr.

In its answer, Trinity denies the allegations. And in a cross-complaint against Brandt, it accuses him of breach of contract, fraud and misappropriation of trade secrets.

MORE BOMBSHELLS

Koper — the granddaughter who has accused the world’s largest Christian broadcaster of playing fast and loose with the ministry’s millions and then provided internal documents to back up her claims – drops a bomb or two here as well.

Jan Crouch, Brittany and Michael Koper, Paul Crouch

Her grandfather and others referred to Brandt as “an old dinosaur,” Koper said in court papers. The building where Brandt worked was regularly referred to as “the old folks home” by her grandparents, Jan and Paul Crouch, attorney John Casoria and other senior management, and “These individuals in particular were extremely concerned that the average age of TBN’s workers was over 50 years,” Koper said.

(The irony, if there is one, is that Paul and Jan Crouch aren’t exactly spring chickens themselves.)

The problem with an over-50 work force, of course, is that older workers earn more money and their medical insurance grows ever more costly.

“In my capacity as Human Resources Director, I was told by senior management to ‘find ways’ to ‘make these individuals retire’ or be ‘less of an expensive drain’ on TBN,” Koper’s filing says. “I spent a considerable amount of effort researching these questions before proposing a retirement incentive program.”

That was rejected, however, and Koper said she was told to implement other “alternative reforms.” She was instructed by her grandfather, Crouch Sr., to run an updated age report on the workers, and ”I was then told to fire everyone over 65 years of age, because they were too old, too sick, and too lazy. The plan was stopped before it was fully implemented, when it was explained to Dr. Crouch that the monetary impact of the inevitable age discrimination lawsuits would exceed the costs of maintaining the insurance plans for these elderly employees.”

The efforts continued, Koper said: Her grandfather, Crouch Sr., was “particularly adamant and excited” about switching workers older than 65 to part-time status, but then compromised on an “over 80″ plan, moving octogenarians to part-time status.

STEALING TRADE SECRETS?

As we said, Trinity denies that there was discrimination on the basis of age or national origin.

And in its cross-complaint against Brandt, Trinity says that he “improperly accessed ” its main computer and network and the proprietary information contained in them, and made numerous unauthorized copies.

“The proprietary information on (Trinity)’s main computer and network, including, but not limited to, databases, lists, and electronic documents and programs and the design/schema of thereof, contain information that is not known to the general public or to other persons who can obtain value from their disclosure or use,” it says. “(Trinity) has maintained the secrecy of this information, which derives economic value from not being generally known.”

That, it said, constitutes trade secrets.

Each party seeks redress from the other, and they are currently battling in court on this, and many other, fronts.

WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH TBN’S FINANCES?

Koper, far left, and the Trinity Broadcasting family

It’s a bit labyrinthine, but stay with us:

Koper, the granddaughter, was human resources director when Brandt brought his suit. She was soon promoted to finance director, and Trinity’s lawyers, Davert & Loe, were supposed to be representing her.

By her account, Koper proceeded to tick off her relatives by objecting to how they were spending ministry money. She was fired by TBN in September, after granting company loans to family members; was sued by the lawyers that who supposed to be representing her in the Brandt case for alleged financial improprieties; and then made public her accusations about how Trinity spends its money.

The swirl of suits and counter-suits lets outsiders see deeper inside Trinity — which bills itself as the world’s largest Christian network — than we have ever been able to see before.

The picture isn’t particularly pretty.

If you’d like to read source documents on the Brandt case, have a look at these:

• Brandt original complaint
• Brandt amended complaint
• Brandt Trinity cross-complaint
• Brandt Trinity answer to amended complaint

TBN Age Discrimination Lawsuit Settled: Employment Class Action May Be in Offing

http://taxdollars.ocregister.com/2012/06/02/settlement-reached-in-tbn-age-discrimination-case/156029/

Settlement reached in TBN age discrimination case

We told you this week that Horst Brandt, a man of German descent who oversaw Trinity Broadcasting Network’s computer systems, filed a lawsuit charging the TV ministry with age discrimination, among other things.

In addition to hiring Brandt as an independent contractor rather than a regular employee (which is cheaper for TBN), and in addition to slurs referencing Brandt’s national origin (“Horst runs his department like Nazi Germany during World War II”), the suit maintained that Trinity fired fired Brandt because he was getting long in the tooth.

Network bigwigs (such as Paul and Jan Crouch, left) referred to Brandt as “an old dinosaur,” the building where Brandt worked was regularly referred to as “the old folks home,” and senior officials were seeking ways to shave older workers off the payroll, according to statements filed by Crouch granddaughter Brittany Koper, who was then head of human resources for Trinity.

Trinity denied the allegations and filed a cross-complaint against Brandt, accusing him of breach of contract, fraud and misappropriation of trade secrets.

Well, after a year of courtroom wrangling, the parties reached a settlement this week. The deal is confidential, and our requests for detail were met with silence from the attorneys directly involved.

We did, however, get an electronic earful from Tymothy MacLeod, who is representing Brittany Koper as she accuses the world’s largest Christian broadcaster of playing fast and loose with the ministry’s millions.

MacLeod notes that the settlement notice “does not specify how much TBN paid Mr. Brandt, and it doesn’t surprise me that TBN wants to avoid broadcasting the fact that they are willing to compromise employment claims like Mr. Brandt’s,” he told us in an email that continued thusly:

“For years, TBN had maintained a bully reputation in the OC employment law community as unyielding and relentless in their defense of employment disputes. TBN spent exorbitant amounts of its ‘charitable’ proceeds on lawyers to achieve that reputation for one purpose: to send a message of intimidation to its own employees. Yet, TBN in-house counsel John Casoria’s uncompromising reputation is a sham, like so much at TBN.

“I hope that TBN’s employees, along with the plaintiff’s bar in Orange County, take notice of this settlement. It is, I think, symbolic of things to come. Mr. Brandt was able to find very decent attorneys, who were not only excellent litigators, but also honest. From my observations, the Feldman firm put Mr. Brandt’s interests first and achieved a settlement for him, rather than pursuing the class action storm that is brewing here. Yet, TBN’s discriminatory policies toward elderly employees – as reflected in the recent settlement with Mr. Brandt – need to be redressed on a larger scale. TBN’s former HR director, Brittany Koper, testified about that pattern of discrimination by TBN against aging employees in the Brandt matter, as well as the underpinnings of those policies in TBN’s self-funded insurance schemes. Ms. Koper has previously explained in court records how TBN’s founder expenses his private chauffeur as a ‘medical benefit,’ while the company pushes other elderly employees to leave TBN before they become a ‘drain’ on TBN’s self-funded medical plan. That is simply despicable, and I am proud to have stood by Ms. Koper while she helped do something to right that wrong in Horst Brandt’s case.

”The bottom line is that there is a lot of work here for employment attorneys in Orange County, and TBN employees should no longer be intimidated to do something about their situation.”

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