Merrill Sees Sex Case as Soap Opera, Not Bias: Susan Antilla

Merrill Sees Sex Case as Soap Opera, Not Bias: Susan Antilla Oct. 27 (Bloomberg) -- To hear Merrill Lynch Co. tell it, Street success story.

asking for $22 million, plus payment for emotional distress and wallet intact.
Or, alternatively, the arbitrators could be persuaded that the law favors Thomas, who endured a crude, hostile workplace support that went to her male colleagues.
After 37 hearing days, 15 volumes of exhibits, and 8,000 pages of testimony, lawyers for Merrill and Thomas gave closing arguments Tuesday to a panel of three poker-faced arbitrators.

Thomas, 52, is one of only a half-dozen women in a 1997 way through the arbitration process. Most of the 900 litigants in Lynch settled before any hearing took place. Thomas was one of eight named plaintiffs in the suit.

given the complexity of the case. What is clear, though, is that defense, in which a female plaintiff is characterized either as crazy, or a little on the loose side.
Thomas, who favors a buttoned-down look, would be an unlikely contender for the ``sluts designation.

Even Merrill s lawyer, Andrew J. Schaffran, described Thomas as ``impeccably honest. Thomas says she was appalled by office episodes that underwear of a Merrill woman.

With the ``slut defense off the table, Schaffran s remarks in closing arguments veered toward the ``nuts argument.
She was ``hard to get along with, and had a ``fixation about being assigned lousy clerical help, he told the arbitrators. Besides, ``We know from the record that Ms.

Thomas has a personality disorder, he said.
case of chronic fatigue syndrome, which limited her ability to work long hours. The Thomas case ``has nothing to do with discrimination, harassment or retaliation, Schaffran told the arbitrators.

Rather, it involved the breakup of an engagement her life, he said.
violins.
Or not.

Thomas s lawyer, Jeffrey Liddle, described her as a scratch Lynch with the capability to succeed in that man s world. Over time, though, Thomas became increasingly vocal in her complaints distributed more generously to her male colleagues than to her.
get these handouts, Schaffran said.

1993, describing lopsided account distributions and other discriminatory practices at Merrill.
Later, during the discovery process, Thomas would read a memo by one of those executives showing that no study had been done.
in Thomas s calculations of damages.

He argued that other women in Thomas s office were quite successful, raising the question of why Thomas couldn t cut it when they could.
the 1997 class action, sometimes winning settlements just as their arbitration dates approached.
unequal account distributions, ``gifts of dildos and vulgar pictures, and an old-boy atmosphere where the numbers show that men get helped in ways that women don t?

million.
Thomas was not being treated differently, Liddle said.
over that fiance back in 1989.

But you know how those crazy women can be.
(Susan Antilla, author of ``Tales From the Boom-Boom Room: Culture of Sexual Harassment, is a Bloomberg News columnist. The opinions expressed are her own.