Justices limit pay-discrimination lawsuits

WASHINGTON, May 29 (UPI) -- A split U.S. Supreme Court said Tuesday employees alleging pay discrimination may not collect back pay from before their initial federal complaint.

The 5-4 ruling, written by Justice Samuel Alito, said Title VII of the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964 limits pay-discrimination claims to 180 days "after the alleged unlawful employment practice occurred."

Lilly Ledbetter, a supervisor at Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.'s Gadsden, Ala., plant, had sued Goodyear for pay discrimination due to her sex. She claimed she made $6,000 a year less than the lowest-paid man doing the same job, even though she worked there for 19 years.

Ledbetter sought compensation for her entire career at the company.

Goodyear argued the six-month statute of limitations limited her recoveries to recent salary history.

A jury in a federal trial awarded Ledbetter $224,000 in back pay and $3.28 million in punitive damages, which a judge reduced to $360,000. The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta reversed the lower court's ruling, citing the statute of limitations.

The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed that ruling.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, in a dissent, said the court didn't understand or was "indifferent to the insidious way in which women can be victims of pay discrimination."