Wal-Mart Appeals Bias Ruling

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world’s largest retailer, asked a U.S. appeals court Tuesday to throw out a decision allowing 1.6 million female employees to sue the company as a group for alleged discrimination.

The lawsuit claims that, since 1998, female employees at Wal-Mart have been paid less than men and offered fewer promotions. Last month, a federal judge ruled that the case could proceed as a class action.

The lawsuit, originally filed by six women, is the largest civil-rights class action ever certified against a private employer, lawyers for the employees said. Wal-Mart denies that it discriminates against female employees.

“This court should review this unprecedented, unmanageable and unconstitutional class now, before the parties and district court are forced to devote vast amounts of time and resources litigating an action that would not in the end survive judicial review,” Wal-Mart said in a petition filed with the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.

In the petition, Wal-Mart said that pay and promotion decisions were made by individual supervisors and that the women who first filed the suit had failed to show that their experiences were typical for all the potential class members.

Plaintiffs have seven days to file an answer to the request.

A three-judge panel then will decide whether to review the class certification ruling.

Wal-Mart shares rose 15 cents to $52.08 on the New York Stock Exchange.