Ex-Salesman, 65, Wins $4 Million in Age Bias Suit : * Workplace: The award by a Los Angeles jury is called one of the largest discrimination judgments ever in California.

After 22 years with the same Ohio-based manufacturing company, Richard S. Gibson was suddenly given a choice: He could take early retirement from his post as Western regional sales manager or accept demotion to a job “one step behind where I started.”

Gibson, now 65, reluctantly took the second option and went to work for a man 30 years his junior at a 25% cut in pay. But the humiliation was too intense to bear, and after four months, he quit.

In 1988, he sued his former employer, ARO Corp. of Bryan, Ohio, arguing that he was forced out as a result of age discrimination.

And on Thursday, a Los Angeles Superior Court jury awarded him $4 million. His attorney, Jonathan W. Biddle, said the judgment is one of the largest ever in a California age discrimination case.

“I think what they hoped I’d do is just retire and get out of their way,” an elated Gibson said Friday from his home in Mission Viejo. “I don’t think it was fair, the way they chose to do it.”

The award consisted of $507,000 for lost salary and benefits, $360,000 for emotional distress and $3.2 million in punitive damages, Biddle said.

ARO attorney Deborah Crandall Saxe said her client “is disappointed in the verdict and believes it is inconsistent with the evidence, which showed that there was no age discrimination and no discharge.”

She said the company plans to appeal.

Gibson said his troubles began in 1987, when without warning he was told he could no longer handle his duties as regional sales manager for ARO, with responsibility for 11 Western states. The company manufactures pneumatically operated equipment used by the aerospace industry.

The news came as a complete shock, Gibson recalled. “When I asked what I’d done wrong, they told me, ‘We’ve got to get this thing up to speed, and we don’t think you have the drive,’ ” Gibson said.

But he said testimony showed that his performance reviews were always “very good or excellent,” and he got regular salary increases and bonuses.

After declining the retirement package, Gibson became an assistant district manager. His territory was now limited to a part of Southern California, and his long-time customers were baffled by his loss of status.

“It was a very degrading and humiliating situation to be in,” he said.

After leaving ARO, Gibson worked briefly for an aluminum company and then became a manufacturers representative for two spray-paint firms, earning substantially less than his former $60,000-a-year income.

“It’s been tough for him to find a job,” Biddle said.