Former Employees Sue Indiana Paper for Religious Discrimination

Excerpted from Former Employees Sue Indiana Paper for Religious Discrimination, by Allie Martin, published Sept 7, 2006, by Agape Press:

Two former employees of a major metropolitan newspaper in Indiana are charging in a federal lawsuit that they were demoted and fired for their Christian beliefs.

James Patterson and Lisa Coffey worked for years on the editorial board of The Indianapolis News. They were transferred to the sister paper, The Indianapolis Star, when the News folded. But in a Title VII religious discrimination lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana, Coffey and Patterson claim that, when the newspaper was bought by the Gannett publishing company, homosexual and pro-homosexual management were installed.

Both Coffey and Patterson had excellent performance reviews for years. But according to Coffey, she was demoted and he was eventually terminated because of their evangelical Christian beliefs…
“The Indianapolis Star has filed a motion to seal all information regarding the gay lifestyles of Star managers involved in this suit,” Coffey notes. “They’re calling it a trade secret, and they’re filing a motion to seal all that information to preclude us from even bringing this up as part of our testimony, which really is silly, because it’s the whole basis of our suit — that that’s the reason why we were forced out of the department.”

Continue reading at Agape Press…