A 60-year-old employee had held several positions related to quality control. While interviewing for a different position in the company, he was asked about his five-year goals and his response was that he planned to be retired within five years. He did not get the job and was told afterward by his supervisor that the "word on the street" was that he did not get the job because of his retirement plans. The supervisor then asked if the employee really was intending to retire in the next few years, and the employee said that he was. Thereafter, his relationship with the supervisor "changed drastically." Within a few days of the conversation, the supervisor completed a perfor- mance appraisal on the employee, indicating that he did not meet expectations in several areas.
Previous performance appraisals, including his review from the previous year, had not indicated any problems. The parties dispute whether the most recent performance appraisal contained any specific examples of performance problems. The employee testified that he had received and signed an eight-page performance appraisal. The em- ployer presented as part of its case a nine-page performance appraisal, with the last page listing specific performance issues. The employee testi- fied that the signature on the longer performance appraisal was not his. The performance appraisal also referenced an incident from the previous year as evidence of poor performance even though no criticisms had been made at the time. A few weeks after the appraisal, the supervisor made a site visit to observe the employee and claimed to have ob- served inadequate performance. The employee was terminated for poor performance several weeks later. He sued. What should the court de- cide? Why? (Maughan v. Alaska Airlines, 2008 U.S. App. LEXIS 12552 (10th Cir.))