Google will be forced to once again defend against claims that it is an ageist organisation following a lawsuit by a former employee. Brian Reed claims that he was let go from the company’s California offices for being too old.

One of Reed’s colleagues at the Mountain View offices accused him of being "slow," "fuzzy," "sluggish" and "lethargic".

When Reed was fired in 2004, he was 54 and he had his initial compliant of ageism dismissed but a California Court has ruled that he does in fact have a case against the search giants. Hired in 2002 as a director of operations and engineering, and fired less than two years later, he was apparently told at the time that he was not a good “cultural fit.”

The new ruling means the case returns to the trial court, and comes after it was decided that those who presided over the first trail erred in dismissing the lawsuit, and said the trial court should have considered “stray remarks” from Reid’s colleagues, including that he was an “old man” and “old fuddy-duddy,” that might be seen as evidence of bias.

Google has hit back though. “Brian Reid was not laid off based on his age,” said Andrew Pederson, a spokesman the Mountain View-based company. “We look forward to demonstrating in court the legitimate, nondiscriminatory reasons why Mr. Reid was let go.”

According to a Reuters report, Reid is a former associate professor of electrical engineering at Stanford University who had helped develop the AltaVista search engine. He had alleged that while at Google, he was subjected to put-downs by a 38-year-old vice president who told him his ideas were “obsolete” and “too old to matter,” and that he was “slow,” “fuzzy,” “sluggish” and “lethargic”.

The plaintiff also said other colleagues made fun of his age, including a joke that a CD jewel case used as his office placard should instead be an “LP,” court records show. You’ve got to admire their wit eh…

Anyway, back to court they all go, Google will he hoping above all else that this doesn’t create too much bad publicity.