Wash. Court of Appeals published opinion — 723421.pdf

Citation: Wash. Court of Appeals published opinion — 723421.pdf
Jurisdiction: Washington (state)
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Original Source: https://www.courts.wa.gov/opinions/pdf/723421.pdf ↗

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is questionable. The fact that Lodis did not think that this conduct, unlike the

conduct that he chose to oppose, was worth mentioning, suggests that evidence

of the conduct lacks probative value as to whether Lodis reasonably believed that

he was opposing discriminatory conduct on other occasions. In any case,

because the excluded evidence did not concern conduct that Lodis openly

opposed, it was far from the core of Lodis's claim that he was discharged in

retaliation for opposing discriminatory conduct.

Moreover, permitting Lodis to present unlimited evidence of alleged

discriminatory conduct by Shenk would have risked significant, unfair prejudice to

Corbis. Such evidence would have left the unfair—and purely collateral-

impression that Shenk was an ageist. Furthermore, permitting Lodis to present

such evidence would have risked jury confusion regarding whether this was

actually an age discrimination case, ratherthan the retaliation case that it was
promoted to be. At a minimum, the presentation ofthis evidence by Lodis, the
presentation of rebuttal evidence by Corbis, and the consideration ofthe sum
total of that evidence by the jury would have imposed undue cost, delay, and

inefficiency on the proceedings.

The trial court did not abuse its discretion by denying Lodis carte blanche

to introduce evidence of alleged discriminatory conduct, regardless of its

connection to his claim.

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No. 72342-1-1/17

B

Lodis next asserts that the trial court erred by allowing Corbis to present

evidence of the first jury's verdict against Lodis on his age discrimination claim,

including the actual verdict form.

Pursuant to the "long-recognized" "open door" rule, "[generally, once a