80-Year-Old Wins $150,000 Age-Bias Settlement

An 80-year-old salesman won partial vindication Tuesday of his age discrimination suit against a Santa Ana manufacturing company when the firm agreed to pay him a $150,000 settlement to drop the litigation.

Angelas Philolias claimed that Gries Dynacast Co. fired him in 1983 because of his age.

Lawyers for the firm contended that there was a legitimate business reason for phasing Philolias out.

The firm, which acknowledged no wrongdoing in the settlement, wanted to use salesmen well-versed in the technical aspects of the firm’s product--precision zinc die casting and plastic injection molding--and Philolias didn’t fit in, according to papers filed in the Orange County Superior Court case.

The change, made in late 1983 and 1984, “has produced a direct and tangible improvement in sales,” according to company papers in the court file.

Philolias told a different story.

When he was 71, Philolias was lured away from his job with a manufacturer’s representative to work as a salesman for the Santa Ana firm, according to court papers and Kenneth J. Sargoy, Philolias’ attorney.

$2 Million in Sales

At 75, he closed more than $2 million in sales for Gries, making him the firm’s No. 1 salesman. But in the next 12 months, Philolias claims, most of his accounts were reassigned to younger men, many of whom he himself had trained.

Far from getting the recognition he deserved, Philolias said, he was fired.

Gries, a subsidiary of Coats & Clark Inc. of Scotland, also claimed that Philolias was hired in 1978 as an independent contractor. As such, the firm maintained, he was not an employee, which California fair employment laws are designed to protect.

Sargoy claimed that under the state civil rights act forbidding business entities to halt dealings because of age, it would make no difference whether Philolias was found to be an independent contractor.

Philolias is a man who just won’t quit--a quality that made him an effective salesman and a successful litigant, according to Sargoy.

“The tough thing was that his wife of 54 years passed away right after the (1983) termination,” Sargoy said. “It was like two tremendous blows to him.”

Sargoy said the legal issues in the case were “very difficult.”

Had the case gone to trial, a former employee would have testified that he heard the sales manager say Philolias was being pushed out and replaced by younger men in order to give the firm “a young, dynamic image,” Sargoy said.

Philolias was replaced by two men “under 30,” Sargoy said.

Michael Johnson, lawyer for Gries, could not be reached for comment.