PHILADELPHIA (AP) – A jury has rejected a lawsuit filed by a white former TV anchor who says his career was cut short over his use of a racial epithet in a newsroom discussion of the word itself.
Fifty-three-year-old Tom Burlington has been working in real estate since losing his job at the local Fox station in Philadelphia in 2007.
The all-white federal jury decided Monday that his firing from WTXF-TV was not racially motivated.
He says he apologized after using the N-word during a newsroom discussion of a story on the ceremonial “burial” of the epithet.
His lawyer argues that a double standard protected black co-workers who said it.
A lawyer for Fox says the weekend anchor continued to press his point by using it several times and calling it “meaningless.”
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