Disney Settles COVID-19 Vaccine Litigation

A case set for trial in 2025 against The Walt Disney Company and Disney Television Studios was settled for an undisclosed sum and dismissed with prejudice in Los Angeles Superior Court.

Pamela Petroff sued the entertainment behemoth in August 2022 after it refused to accommodate religious beliefs that allegedly prevented her from being vaccinated against COVID-19.

“Disney did not dispute the sincerity of Petroff’s beliefs,” wrote Petroff’s attorney Scott Street in his declaration. “Instead, it told her that it could not accommodate her as an unvaccinated person without undue hardship. It told her that it would fire her if she did not take the COVID shots to save her job.”

The employee vaccination mandate was in response to rising numbers of COVID-19 cases at the time.

Petroff was a company receptionist and office manager who worked for the animated shows American Dad and Family Guy.

“She’s no longer there,” said Leslie Manookian, president and founder of the Health Freedom Defense Fund (HFDF), which funded the litigation. “This has been an incredibly painful experience for her because she lives in Southern California. Her dream was always of working for Disney.”

Some 101,159 people died of COVID statewide as of March 10, 2023, according to Statista data. That’s compared to 93,390 in Texas and 86,850 in Florida.

Disney subsidiary 20th Television Animation, which began enforcing the vaccine mandate in April 2022, did not respond to requests for comment.

“The settlement sends a warning to all of corporate America that you cannot trample on your employee’s rights,” Manookian told OrangeCountyLawyers.com. “When other corporations read that Disney was forced to settle, which is what happened, they’re going to understand that this is an area of risk for them.”

Disney Argued That Accommodation to the COVID-19 Vaccination Policy was Unreasonable

In its answer to the lawsuit, Disney argued that Petroff’s complaint was barred because any accommodation to the COVID-19 vaccination policy would have been unreasonable, constituted an undue hardship, and increased a health or safety risk for Petroff and others in the workplace.

“Plaintiff may not recover punitive damages because at all times relevant to the Complaint, Corporate Defendants had in place a policy to prevent discrimination, retaliation, and harassment in the workplace and made good-faith efforts to implement and enforce that policy,” wrote Disney’s attorney Steven Marenberg.

But Petroff, through counsel, alleged in her complaint that she experienced discrimination and intimidation. Petroff’s supervisor, Kara Vallow, was also named as a defendant.

“Disney had known all along they could accommodate Ms. Petroff, that they had to, that it was their responsibility to accommodate her and that they could do so and yet they allowed other staff at Disney to bully and harass her,” Manookian said.

Marenberg did not respond to requests for comment.

Vallow reportedly posted comments about Christians, conservatives, and unvaccinated people on social media. Petroff is a Christian.

“This case was going to show that Disney is not the company they hold themselves up to be,” Manookian added. “They are not honoring their employees. Once it was realized that Ms. Petroff was a young Christian conservative, she was persona non grata.” Persona non grata refers to someone who is unwelcome.

*Photo courtesy https://pixabay.com/users/torstensimon-5039407/