A longtime McDonald’s employee who rose from janitor to store manager and alleges she was wrongfully terminated in 2023 because of disability issues is fighting to keep a defamation claim as part of her lawsuit.
Katherine Vivanco’s Los Angeles Superior Court complaint includes the defamation claim because she contends that false allegations about her in the workplace were used as pretextual reasons to fire her. One of those allegedly untrue assertions against Vivanco was that she told the general manager she replaced at the Sylmar store she once had sex with her boyfriend in a McDonald’s parking lot and had also engaged in atypical sex.
The former general manager also claimed he was offended because he is gay and believed Vivanco should not have shared such sexual details with him, according to Vivanco’s court papers filed Monday with Judge Jerrold Abeles in opposition to McDonald’s anti-SLAPP motion.
In its anti-SLAPP motion, McDonald’s maintains the defamation claim infringes on the company’s free-speech and ability to investigate accusations against Vivanco, including sexual harassment.
“To ensure speech related to such complaints and related investigation is not chilled through retaliatory litigation, the California Legislature and courts have long protected speech associated with harassment complaints and investigations thereon,” according to the McDonald’s attorneys’ court papers.
The state’s anti-SLAPP — Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation — law is intended to prevent people from using courts, and potential threats of a lawsuit, to intimidate those who are exercising their First Amendment rights.
In her suit, Vivanco says she was hired in 2001 at age 19 as a crew member at a Glendale store who cleaned bathrooms and the kitchen area. Vivanco is a single mother of three children. She worked in Glendale for 19 years, was promoted to store manager in 2016 and was transferred in 2021 to the Sylmar location on Encinitas Avenue.
After arriving at Sylmar, Vivanco reported to management that the store’s former general manager left behind serious operational problems, including broken equipment, staffing issues and employees who were not properly trained, according to her court papers.
Vivanco attempted to correct the Sylmar store’s problems by enforcing McDonald’s policies and holding employees accountable, which angered some of those workers and some of them later made false allegations against her, her court papers state. When the Sylmar store’s former general manager allegedly made the sex-related comments concerning Vivanco, she denied them and he contended he felt threatened by her comments about the condition of the store that he left for her to fix, according to Vivanco’s court papers.
But McDonald’s adopted the former general manager’s accusations and began an investigation against her that was biased and minimized evidence favorable to her, Vivanco’s court papers state. When Vivanco denied making sexual and age-related comments, the investigator faulted her for giving short answers and concluded she did not fully participate by answering questions completely, Vivanco’s court papers state.
Vivanco was fired in May 2023. She maintains the actual reason she lost her job was because she sought accommodations after her doctor told her not to lift items over a certain weight.
“Instead, they began a campaign of harassment and retaliation against Ms. Vivanco,” the plaintiff’s court papers state.
In addition to defamation, Vivanco’s suit, filed in February 2024, also alleges wrongful termination, retaliation, sexual harassment, disability discrimination, failure to accommodate and engage in the interactive process, failure to prevent discrimination, harassment and retaliation. She seeks unspecified compensatory and punitive damages.