A judge in California has ruled that actress Nicollette Sheridan’s wrongful termination lawsuit can move forward to trial where a jury will decide whether her character on the hit TV show, “Desperate Housewives,” was unfairly killed off. The judge in Los Angeles County threw out Sheridan’s claims of sexual harassment and assault, but gave the green light to the claims of wrongful termination, unlawful retaliation and battery to proceed to trial this summer, starting June 8.
Sheridan’s character, Edie Britt, was killed off the show by having Britt die in a car accident in the middle of the season. In April 2010, Sheridan sued the show’s creator and executive producer, Marc Cherry. She says that she was fired for unlawful reasons and that Cherry hit her during a fight and sexually harassed her.
The judge listened to both sides of the arguments for awhile, but then said that it was clear that a jury needed to hear the arguments and make a decision on the case, according to The Seattle Times.
ABC argues that Sheridan’s character was killed off for cost-cutting purposes and the decision was made to do so by Cherry months before he and Sheridan had an argument. They also insist that Sheridan was never battered and point out that many of Sheridan’s claims against her former employer have been tossed out by the courts at this point.
Sheridan does not believe that she was killed off to save money because her character was cut out of the show in the middle of the season while Sheridan was still owed money on her contract. Sheridan says she is glad she is being “treated fairly” by being allowed to have her day in court in front of a jury, according to The Seattle Times.
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Judge clears ‘Housewives’ firing lawsuit for trial (The Seattle Times)