A federal court judge in Helena has ordered the U.S. Small Business Association to pay a former employee almost half a million dollars, and rehire her, as part of an unusual retaliation and wrongful discharge case.

In a ruling released Tuesday, U.S. District Court Judge Charles Lovell wrote that Jo Alice Mospan, former district director of the Helena SBA office, ruined the career of Mary Conway-Jepsen, and continued to retaliate after Conway-Jepsen resigned in 1997.

The harassment, according to Conway-Jepsen and others, was because she objected to Mospan's discrimination against male employees in the Helena SBA offices.

Testimony in the case indicated that Mospan went so far as to create a "hit list" of male employees, and in 1994 recruited another woman, Nora Walsh, for the express purpose of making life miserable and ultimately firing certain top male employees in the Helena SBA office so they could be replaced with females.

Between the time Mospan came to Helena in 1992 and retired to Alabama in 2000, five of the top male employees -- all on what Walsh termed Mospan's "hit list" -- retired. One of the men, Jerry Christison, filed a wrongful discharge lawsuit, but it was dismissed on a technicality.

Attorney Jim Hunt, who represented Conway-Jepsen, said that for his client, the most important decision the judge made was to believe her testimony over that of Mospan.

"Mary Conway-Jepsen loved her job -- it was one she wanted to keep until she retired," Hunt said on Tuesday. "This wasn't normal harassment, either. It was a setup. ... Somebody in a high position in a federal agency ought not to be allowed to act illegally and get away with it."

Mospan couldn't be reached for comment, and local SBA officials declined to discuss the case.

According to court documents, Mospan and Conway-Jepsen met while both were working in the California SBA offices. At that point, Mospan was expecting to move to the Helena SBA office; Conway-Jepsen said she had purchased some retirement property in Montana and said she would like to move there.

As part of their conversation, Conway-Jepson said Mospan believed the Helena SBA "was full of white males and that she was going to do something about that."

At that time, most of the senior employees and supervisors were male. Conway-Jepsen said she thought Mospan planned to replace the male employees with females through the natural process -- resignations or retirement -- of attrition.

Lovell writes that when Mospan arrived at the Helena SBA in 1992, "she established herself immediately as a tough DD (district director) by disciplining almost half of the employees, both male and female, for improper use of SBA funds to defray some of the costs of a retirement party for the outgoing district director, John Cronholm."

Mospan continued to mete out discipline frequently to SBA employees, but particularly to certain male SBA employees.

"Mospan's everyday conversation with her employees often contained profanity, and she liberally utilized the "f" word apparently for emphasis," Lovell wrote. "She was described, in today's parlance, as an 'in your face' type micro manager."

Nora Walsh testified that she met Mospan at a director's meeting in Virginia in 1993, and Mospan began recruiting Walsh to come to work at the Helena SBA. Walsh said Mospan showed her a "hit list" in August 1994 of the male employees Mospan intended to fire, most of whom were longtime career SBA employees with good work records, ratings and performance histories.

Walsh said that shortly after her arrival at the Helena SBA, she realized her job was to fire Christison, a 25-year SBA employee who had always received excellent to superior job evaluations, and another man. Mospan used to call her at home and urge her to move faster, saying she was being too kind, Walsh said. But meanwhile, she was getting to like and respect the two men.

Finally, Walsh wanted out and told Mospan she should be allowed to return quietly to SBA headquarters. Instead, Walsh testified that Mospan began a campaign of retaliation against her, and pulled strings to have her reassigned to an unfavorable position in Fresno, Calif.

Conway-Jepsen testified that she too initially had a good relationship with Mospan, but once she realized that her boss was promoting women "on the backs of the guys," their association soured.

Some of Mospan's conduct was petty, Lovell said, like reviewing Conway-Jepsen's outgoing letters for one month and criticizing her for four clerical errors. More seriously, Mospan allegedly actively worked against Conway-Jepsen's efforts on three projects with local businesses.

Conway-Jepsen said Mospan set her up to make mistakes, screamed and swore at her, and the last straw was finding her files had been rifled through and that a document had been removed. Conway-Jepsen said she feared might be framed for some sort of illegal contracting activity.

By 1997, the personal price of maintaining her job had become too high and she resigned.

When Mospan took the stand, she told an entirely different story, denying every significant allegation made by Conway-Jepsen, Walsh, Christison and others. In addition, current SBA employees testified on behalf of Mospan.

Lovell said this would be a close case if Mospan's testimony was considered true and Conway-Jepson's witnesses were discounted. But since the testimony was in direct conflict, he had to determine who was telling the truth.

In his ruling, the judge wrote that he found "numerous problems and discrepancies" with Mospan's account of the situation, and concluded that Mospan's testimony "is unbelievable." He added that those who testified on her behalf, including current SBA district director Michelle Johnston, had benefited from Mospan's actions.

"When Christison's head rolled, Johnston got his job. When plaintiff's (Conway-Jensen) head rolled, Johnston got plaintiff's job. Finally, Johnston became director of the entire operation. How could she do anything other than support these policies of which she is the pre-eminent beneficiary?" Lovell wrote.

"... The court makes no criticism of these employee-witnesses and has considered their testimony and given it the weight it deserves. Their testimony, however, does not detract measurably from the overwhelming case presented by Plaintiff's witnesses."

He added that Conway-Jepsen is an "intelligent, knowledgeable, and aggressive program manager" who had supervised large staffs and was authorized to enter into government contracts of $50 million. He added that while she notified her supervisors and tried to get transferred to another SBA office, her requests were ignored.

"Her demeanor is that of a tough fighter, not a person who would easily wilt under pressure," Lovell wrote. "This continuous pattern of retaliatory treatment spanned a period of approximately two and one-half years. No reasonable employee could be expected to put up with Mospan's harassment for a longer period of time."

Lovell ordered the SBA to give Conway-Jepsen $433,000 in back pay and to reinstate her in a large SBA office where her skills can be utilized, and given credit for years lost. He added that she also should be paid $50,000 for emotional pain and suffering, and an undetermined amount for attorney's fees.