GLENDALE : Whistle-Blower Gets $350,000 Settlement

An engineer who claimed he was demoted and eventually fired by a Burbank aerospace firm for blowing the whistle on fraudulent testing practices has won a $350,000 settlement from the company.

A Glendale Superior Court jury agreed this week with Sohrab Haroonian’s claim that he was improperly terminated in 1990 by Elmo Semiconductor Corp., a firm that makes and tests parts for defense contractors and manufacturers of medical devices such as pacemakers and heart valves. Haroonian had worked for the company for four years.

Haroonian, a senior test engineer, claimed in his lawsuit that he was ordered on numerous occasions to write false reports saying that parts had passed inspections when they actually had not, said his attorney, Cynthia Hafif. “His supervisors would also change test reports so as to conceal defective parts. He also witnessed or was advised of instances where parts were improperly disposed of after failing tests, precluding the ability to conduct failure analysis on these parts,” Hafif said.

Hafif said Haroonian reported the incidents to the company’s management but no action was taken. Eventually, he was demoted to the inventory department and later fired.

But Paul Lax, an attorney for Elmo Semiconductor, said the firm will appeal the verdict.

Lax said he spoke to jurors after the verdict was handed down, and he believes they may have ruled in Haroonian’s favor even though “they did not find fraud, and they did not find illegal activities had taken place.”

“They did, however, find that Mr. Haroonian believed something was going on. He erroneously believed that,” Lax said. He said the case wrongly indicates that juries can award damages to fired workers who “see a conspiracy behind every bush.”

Lax also said he believes “hearsay evidence” was admitted during the trial, and the company will ask that the case be retried.

Haroonian’s attorneys had asked the court for $1.6 million in financial damages, plus unspecified payment for emotional distress and punitive damages. The jury’s award consisted of $200,000 in lost wages and $150,000 for emotional distress.