Plaintiff in discrimination suit says Ford is withholding damaging videotape

By

Posted 8:05AM on Wednesday, January 23, 2002

DETROIT - A Ford Motor Co. manager suing the company for discrimination is offering a $500 reward for a videotape of former president and CEO Jacques Nasser that his lawyer calls "the smoking gun" but the automaker says doesn't exist. John Kovacs is offering the reward through his lawyer, James Fett of Pinckney. A letter written by a man saying he was a Ford employee published in the August 2000 edition of "Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture" says that during a diversity training session with managers, Nasser "stated that he did not like the sea of white faces in the audience and that one of his prime directives was to ensure that in the future, our company would reflect the broad spectrum of customers that we serve." "We did a diligent search and we don't believe that a tape with that exact phrasing exists," said Ford spokeswoman Anne Marie Gattari. "We had people look through all those tapes. All portions of the tapes that referred to diversity were copied and given to Fett. He has what we have," she said. "Nasser had all of his events taped and FCN (Ford Cable Network) would be the only entity that did the filming," Kovacs said. "In short, they are lying when they say they can't find the tape." I just can't believe it," said Fett. "It would be extremely incriminating. That is the most incriminating piece of evidence we know of. That is the smoking gun." Kovacs was suspended April 9 from his management position in the Ford Motor Credit human resources department after Fett sent a letter on his behalf to chairman William Clay Ford Jr. asking him to end the company's diversity hiring measures. Attached to the letter were several internal documents including minutes of human resources committee meetings and lists of employees being considered for promotions or transfers. The automaker charged Kovacs stole confidential documents, but he countered that he had a right to them as a human resources manager. The letter and the papers were put into the public record as part of court documents related to Kovacs's reverse discrimination suit, alleging he was passed over for promotions because he is a white man. Fett said Fred Mateer, former executive vice president for human resources, testified in a deposition last week that no determination had ever been made that Kovacs stole the documents and if he did, he would have been fired. The former head of Ford Credit, Don Winkler, is to be deposed Wednesday. Winkler resigned under pressure for unrelated reasons last month. Fett said there have been discussions of settling the case out of court but Kovacs would not agree to any deal that is predicated on him leaving the company. Ford agreed in December to pay $10.5 million to settle two class-action lawsuits accusing the automaker of discriminating against older, white men in the name of diversity. The reverse-discrimination lawsuits claimed that Ford's employee evaluation system favored so-called diversity candidates -- namely younger women and minorities -- and that a disproportionate number of older, white men were given low grades, costing them raises or promotions. In settling, Ford admitted no wrongdoing. Ford's performance evaluation system, put into place last year, was used to evaluate about 18,000 managers and supervisors, or about 5 percent of Ford's work force. Employees were graded A, B, or C. Those receiving a C could lose bonuses and raises, and two consecutive C's could mean dismissal. Initially, at least 10 percent of employees were to be graded C, but that was lowered to 5 percent before quotas were eliminated altogether last July. The plaintiffs claimed that before the grading program, they had received positive evaluations. But under the new system, they said, they got C's while some women and minorities with less experience or inferior work records were rated higher. The system had been promoted by Nasser, who resigned under pressure Oct. 30 as Ford president and chief executive. William Clay Ford Jr. succeeded him as chief executive. A hearing is scheduled for March 14 in Wayne County Circuit Court where plaintiffs in the suits can testify as to the fairness of the proposed settlement.