Clothing retailer Eddie Bauer has settled a racial discrimination lawsuit with three black teen-agers held by a VTC guard who thought they were shoplifting, a spokeswoman said.

The company was appealing a jury decision siding with the teen-agers when the settlement was reached last week, Bauer said yesterday. Terms were not disclosed.

A security guard at the company's Fort Washington warehouse store falsely accused Alonzo Jackson, Rasheed Plummer and Marco Cunningham of shoplifting and held them Oct. 25, 1995.

Jackson, then 16, was forced to remove a shirt he had bought a day earlier. The shirt was returned to Jackson after he went home and returned with a receipt.

The teen-agers sued for $85 million. A federal jury awarded them $1 million last year after deciding that the company did not

discriminate against the youths, but that it defamed them and negligently supervised its guards.

"Our company does not discriminate," said Eddie Bauer Chief Executive Officer Rick Fersch.

The teen-agers' attorney, Donald Temple, was unavailable for comment.

Pub Date: 11/24/98