A federal jury in Brooklyn sided with NY1 in reaching a verdict today in the sexual harassment lawsuit brought against the cable TV station by former reporter Adele Sammarco.
The verdict, announced in Brooklyn federal court, took the panel of seven men and one woman just 41 minutes to reach.
Sammarco had her head down while the verdict was read and showed no emotion.
She did not have a comment on the outcome of her lawsuit as she left the courthouse.
The two-week trial featured testimony and even raunchy props — including a mock photo of Sammarco with enlarged breasts — backing the former anchorwoman’s claim that she was on the receiving end of a series of inappropriate sex jokes.
Sammarco, 43, who sued for unspecified damages, claimed the Time Warner-owned, 24-hour local cable news station fired her in 2001 in retaliation for her complaints.
NY 1 honchos Steve Paulus and Peter Landis, both defendants in the case along with parent company Time Warner, argued that her contract wasn’t renewed because she was a bad reporter.
A juror, Marie Gorini, 55, a dental office manager from Brooklyn, said there “wasn’t enough evidence” proving Sammarco had been victimized.
“We felt that the evidence just didn’t support the claim,” she added. “We just felt there wasn’t enough evidence to prove for the plaintiff.”
Outside the courthouse, a relieved Paulus said, “Anyone who knows the organization knows these claims were not true.”
He said he “tried to be good to” Sammarco.
Sammarco testified that she was forcibly kissed by reporter Gary Anthony Ramsay one night after a party — an allegation the now-former NY1 reporter vehemently denied on the stand.
Andrew Laufer, Sammarco’s lawyer, said during closing arguments that his client was “exposed to repeated sexual harassment” and that all the witnesses for the defense were current employees who had an interest in the outcome of the case.
“They get their paycheck from New York 1,” he said. “I thought the news industry was supposed to expose the truth — not hide from it.”
Sammarco had also testified that during her coverage of the racially tense 2000 trial in the slaying of Amadou Diallo, her cameraman and sound engineers were more interested in prying into her love life and racial views than cover what was happening in the courtroom.
On a daily basis, she said, her news crew would ask her, “Would you ever bring a black man home to your father?” and “Who would you sleep with? When did you first have sex?”
She also said that they would refer to her as “BBB,” for “Big Butt Booty.”
“I was embarrassed. I was hurt. I was humiliated,” Sammarco said.
Tearing up during her testimony, she said that she complained to the HR rep, “but she did nothing to help me.”