RADLEY -v.- EASTMAN KODAK COMPANY, 1999 U.S. App. LEXIS 23372 (2nd Cir. September 24, 1999)(unpublished)-The court affirmed the district court’s dismissal of the claims of five employees that representatives of Kodak violated the fiduciary duties imposed by ERISA sections 29 U.S.C. 1104 and 1140. The retirees asserted that retirement counselors in Kodak's Benefits Department materially misled them in 1991 by telling them, as they were considering retirement, that no changes to the pension plan were forthcoming. One month after these alleged representations, a new lucrative retirement-incentive plan was announced, one in which the retirees could not participate.
This case appeared for the second time before this court, after a prior remand. The Court reinforced its prior reasoning that although an employer does not enjoy carte blanche to make statements that the employer knows to be false, or that have no reasonable basis in fact, Kodak’s representatives made statements that were accurate representations of then-existing facts or, at most, personal predictions or opinions about whether they believed the plan then in effect would change in the near future. Thus, they were not misleading material representations.
