Tardif v Town of Southold

Plaintiff, John Tardif, brought about an action to recover damages for age discrimination in this appeal of the Supreme Court decision granting defendants’ motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint. Plaintiff alleged that the Town of Southold and the Town’s police department did not appoint him as a police officer due to discrimination on the basis of his age. Plaintiff argued that he had “the best qualifications” and “the number one test score” on the police officer examination.

Defendants argued that they did not discriminate against plaintiff due to his age but that the reason they did not hire him was because he submitted deceptive responses in his police officer application. The defendants thus established that they had a legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason for not hiring plaintiff. Plaintiff failed to raise triable issues of fact concerning whether he was deprived of his constitutional right to due process, whether he was entitled to a name-clearing hearing, whether he was deprived of a protected liberty interest, and whether he was denied equal protection.

Accordingly, the Court affirmed the order granting summary judgment dismissing the complaint, with costs.