In May, KUSI-TV sought a new trial after losing its pay-equity fight with former anchor Sandra Maas. Lawyers for the station filed arguments exceeding 7,800 words, with 500 pages of exhibits.
Attorneys for plaintiff Maas replied with 8,500 words.
On Wednesday — almost a week after both sides were heard in court — Judge Ronald Frazier issued a ruling of about 50 words, ending: “Defendant’s Motion for New Trial is DENIED.”
The trial judge also rejected KUSI’s motion to throw out much of the $1.7 million jury judgment against the conservative station.
Maas wasn’t surprised.
“Everything has turned out just as we expected,” Maas said. “From the very beginning, I had faith in the merits of the case, the justice system and my incredible team of lawyers.”
McKinnon Broadcasting Co. — in the process of selling KUSI-TV to Texas-based Nester Media Group — didn’t respond to a request for comment.
But after the month-long trial ended March 9, KUSI lawyer Ken Fitzgerald told the station that if his motion to set aside the verdict were denied, “we’ll appeal,” which he said would take about a year.
“Once it’s in the Court of Appeal, it’s a very different audience,” Fitzgerald told “Good Morning San Diego,” referring to a three-judge panel in the 4th District. KUSI has 60 days to file a notice of appeal.
The night before, he told “Good Evening San Diego” that “this jury … ran away with passion or prejudice or dislike.” He accused Maas lawyer Josh Gruenberg of raising issues of race and harassment, which Fitzgerald called “wholly improper and totally irrelevant.”
In closing arguments, Gruenberg also “made a big deal about equal rights in general … an important case for women everywhere,” Fitzgerald told KUSI.
But the case was not about women’s rights, the KUSI lawyer said.
“It was about one woman’s right, Sandra Maas’ right,” Fitzgerald said. “The comments were made to try to stir up the jury to do something for the general cause of pay equity.”
In a pair of filings May 22, the Maas team of Gruenberg, Joshua Pang and Pamela Vallero told Frazier that “KUSI hauled in a slew of current employees to slander Maas’s character and work ethic” and “muddied the waters by inundating the jury with salary information of irrelevant and lower-paid anchors.”
But KUSI’s strategy backfired, the Maas lawyers said.
“The jury saw through KUSI’s convoluted and contrived lies,” they said. “Additionally, the station’s tactical decision to expand the scope of relevant evidence backfired and showed it indeed has a problem that goes beyond ‘one woman.'”
Further, the Maas lawyers said KUSI’s request for a new trial “reads like a narrative of excuses it wishes to tell its own viewers and supporters.”
Last October, Judge Frazier denied a KUSI bid to have the case thrown out via summary judgment. The station also made several requests for evidence. His ruling exceeded 600 words.
In Wednesday’s brief minute order rejecting a new trial, Frazier gave no reasons.
In her email response, Maas, 60, noted the clock is ticking on being paid by KUSI.
“I’m earning 10% interest on my $1.75 million judgment,” she said. “Better than the stock market. Not to mention the millions more they’ll be coughing up in attorney fees.”
Gruenberg, who took the case in June 2019, has yet to file a motion specifying what KUSI owes his law firm.
During the trial — in which KUSI argued that former co-anchor Allen Denton was paid as much as $90,000 a year more than Maas on account of merit — the station’s lawyers noted her lack of an Emmy award (compared with Denton’s three regional Emmys).
That’s no longer the case.
Maas, now working on a documentary about “America’s sick healthcare system,” won her first Emmy last month for a video series — Trailblazing Women — on behalf of the Women’s Museum of California, where she is board president.
She said the Emmy was especially meaningful because of its subject matter — former Fox News anchors Gretchen Carlson and Julie Roginsky talking about their efforts to ensure women who experience abuse in the workplace are never silenced.
Maas may make news again on the KUSI front, saying she plans to write a book about her experience working 15 years for McKinnon Broadcasting Co.
She vowed to reveal “the behind-the-scenes craziness that I couldn’t talk about in the courtroom.”
Meanwhile she expressed gratitude for the “avalanche of support I continue to receive from so many people in San Diego and beyond. ” She added: “Who knows what nefarious move McKinnon Broadcasting Co. will employ next?”
