Ex-Twentieth Century Fox VP Gets Partial Win in Severance Suit

A former vice president for Twenty-First Century Fox Inc. partially advanced her lawsuit claiming she was forced out and denied severance after declining to switch jobs following a merger with Walt Disney Co., according to a California federal judge’s ruling.

Bernadette Paine can press claims that Fox and Disney breached her employment contract by wrongly characterizing her 2019 termination as voluntary and thus not eligible for severance, Judge Virginia A. Phillips of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California said in a decision docketed June 11.

But Paine can’t move forward with claims for fiduciary breach ...