The Fresno Grizzlies face a lawsuit for giving free tickets out to women as part of a ladies’ night promotion.
Al Rava, the attorney for plaintiffs Harry Crouch and Christine Johnson, has a history litigating similar promotions.
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The big picture: Last year Crouch and Johnson filed a lawsuit against the Grizzlies claiming the ladies’ night promotion was sex discrimination. In March they filed the class action lawsuit in federal court, seeking $5 million in damages.
- Crouch and Johnson attended a game at Chukchansi Park on May 25, 2023. Crouch paid $18 for his ticket, while Johnson was let in the stadium for free.
- “Defendants’ sex-based pricing for Plaintiffs and all other attendees to the Ladies’ Night game was arbitrary, invidious, unlawful, and unreasonable, and intentionally denied all attendees equal accommodations, advantages, facilities, privileges, or services based solely on their sex or gender…” the lawsuit reads.
The backstory: Rava has made a career in litigating ladies’ night promotions, most notably for settling with the Oakland A’s in 2009.
- The A’s held a Mother’s Day promotion in 2004 offering free mammograms and 7,500 floppy plaid sun hats to women.
- Rava settled the class action case with the A’s for $500,000.
- He has also sued a women’s golf clinic in Encinitas, an adult store that was having a ladies’ night and a gun range for the same promotion.
- A lawsuit he had against the Los Angeles Angeles for providing free tote bags to women on Mother’s Day was thrown out in 2007.
- Crouch is the President of the National Coalition for Men, an organization founded in 1977 committed to ending harmful discrimination and stereotypes against males.
