Female Executive Alleges Bias in Company Bonus Plan : Courts: Suit contends male Nichols workers received extra money but treasurer was excluded. Officials of medical testing firm have not commented.

The treasurer of Nichols Institute has filed a lawsuit accusing the company of offering male executives at or below her level bonuses worth as much as 100% of their salaries.

The sexual discrimination lawsuit by Joleen Kahn alleges that the San Juan Capistrano medical testing company, through fraud and deceit, held her earnings down while giving at least one male executive at her level a stock option bonus valued at $230,000 more than she received.

Her lawyer, Paul D. Copenbarger of Santa Ana, said the suit, filed Friday in Orange County Superior Court in Santa Ana, should come as no surprise to the company. “We’ve had discussions about the case,” he said.

Moreover, Copenbarger said, “I have reason to believe that there will be additional lawsuits from other female employees.”

Corporate executives were unavailable for comment. Kathryn Littleton, a spokeswoman for Nichols’ parent company, Corning Inc., would not comment. The Corning, N.Y., glass and housewares maker acquired Nichols last month and renamed it Corning Nichols Institute.

Kahn’s suit accuses the company of lying to her three separate times about the pay of a male colleague working at her level.

The suit asserts that Paul Bellamy, Nichols Institute’s acting chief executive, told Kahn in June and October last year and in February this year that her compensation “and that of a particular male co-worker were equal.”

Instead, Kahn contends, the co-worker participated in a bonus program that could have doubled his salary. That “supposedly equal” male co-worker received stock options of 30,000 shares, or a 50% bonus, for achieving goals set for him, the suit asserts.

Kahn didn’t know that such a bonus program existed, the suit contends. She did receive stock options of 7,500 shares as a bonus, however, for achieving all goals set for her.

In July, Kahn filed a discrimination claim with the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing. Copenbarger said the agency sent the complaint to Nichols Institute, and the company responded. The agency, though, did not take any other action except to notify her last month that she had a right to file a civil lawsuit.

Kahn, who was hired in 1987, became an assistant treasurer in 1988, and was acting treasurer from 1991 through the end of January. She was promoted to treasurer in February and is paid an annual salary of $100,000.