Court: Age discrimination unproven in Boeing sale

WICHITA, Kan. — A federal appeals court has ruled that former employees failed to demonstrate a pattern of age discrimination by The Boeing Co. and Spirit AeroSystems.

Ninety former Boeing workers claimed they lost their jobs because of their age when the Chicago-based aerospace manufacturer sold its commercial aircraft operations in Kansas and Oklahoma to Onex Corp. in 2005.

Onex formed Wichita-based Spirit AeroSystems to handle those former Boeing operations.

In its Monday ruling, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a district judge’s 2010 ruling that there is too little evidence to put the case before a jury.

The appeals court found that the hiring practices did not unfairly hurt older workers and that they failed to show the companies intended to interfere with their pension benefits.