“Buy beef semen” is not a phrase you see every day, but that’s the core of Navasota, Texas-based Inguran’s business model and is front and center on the company’s website.
This week, a Houston federal court gave clearance for the sex-sorted semen and bovine embryo producer to go back to focusing on its business model after dismissing an employment discrimination lawsuit filed in 2019 by a former software developer for the company.
The plaintiff, Angel Ortiz, alleged Inguran (d/b/a Sexing Technologies) unfairly terminated him in retaliation after he complained of experiencing a hostile work environment for his age and Cuban national origin. He said the discrimination also caused him to be denied a raise, promotion and longer vacation benefits. He brought claims under Title VII and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA).
Ortiz worked at Inguran as a software developer from 2016 to 2019. He was 59 at the time he filed his November 2019 lawsuit. He alleged that colleague Daniel Castellani treated Ortiz worse than the several younger, Brazilian software developers Castellani managed and that Castellani had a negative influence over Ortiz’s promotions, raises, vacation and daily work schedule by falsely claiming to superiors that Ortiz underperformed.
Last October, Inguran filed a summary judgment motion that argued the lawsuit should be dismissed because Ortiz’s claims for age and national origin discrimination and retaliation claims fail as a matter of law. As U.S. District Judge David Hittner notes in this week’s ruling, Ortiz had also brought hostile work environment claims as a cause of action, but because those claims did not make it on the amended complaint, they are now moot.
In making his decision, Judge Hittner used the McDonnell Douglas analysis, a four-part, burden-shifting test that Texas federal courts use when evaluating ADEA and Title VII claims based strictly on circumstantial evidence. The first stage places the burden on the plaintiff to develop a prima facie case, which the plaintiff usually is able to prove without much issue, Inguran’s lawyers said, which then shifts the burden to the defendants in stage two.
But in this instance, Judge Hittner dismissed Ortiz’s discrimination claims during the first stage because he determined Ortiz failed to identify any comparators — similarly situated employees at Ortiz’s workplace that could be assessed to determine whether he was treated less favorably than them.
“In particular, the court found that [Ortiz] produced no evidence that the members of the Brazilian development team whom he contended were treated more favorably had the same job responsibilities, shared the same supervisor, had their employment status determined by the same person, or had a similar history of violations or infringements,” said Brian Patterson, a partner in Akin Gump’s Houston and Dallas offices who represents Inguran.
Patterson elaborated that this was important because Judge Hittner’s ruling “highlights that focusing on the lack of evidence of ‘comparators’ is a separate and distinct path to prevailing on a summary judgment for employers, as opposed to focusing on the legitimate, non-discriminatory reasons for the plaintiff’s termination.”
Ortiz’s lead lawyer, Nathan Inurria of the Farah Law Group in Houston, did not respond to a message seeking comment.
On Monday, the same day Judge Hittner issued his summary judgment ruling, he signed a final judgment dismissing the case since the summary judgment resulted in favor of Inguran “on all pending claims in this lawsuit.”
This is the second time Akin Gump has prevailed in a case for Sexing Technologies. In September 2019, a San Antonio-based team led by partner Kirt O’Neill obtained an $8.6 million verdict in a Wisconsin federal court after a jury found that ABS Global infringed three of ST’s patents for sperm cell sorting technology used in mammalian gender selection.