This one company I’m going to tell you about today allegedly acted so egregiously that it drew the attention of (and a lawsuit from) the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Imagine that someone comes to HR one day and complaints about sex discrimination. Do you? Reassure the complainant that the…
Articles Posted in Retaliation
Could an anonymous complaint about COVID-19 spawn a sex-based retaliation claim?
Winning a retaliation lawsuit against an employer isn’t easy. The plaintiff-employee must prove three elements: she engaged in a protected activity; the defendant-employer took an employment action adverse to the plaintiff; and there was a causal connection between the protected activity and the adverse employment action. A journalist at a…
By the time she made it to court, her discrimination and retaliation claims were D.O.A.
An individual who wants to bring federal disability discrimination and retaliation claims against an employer can’t just go right to court. No, courts would choke with employment lawsuits. Instead, she must first exhaust her administrative remedies at the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission by filing a charge of discrimination. But…
Does Title VII allow a current employer to retaliate against HR for testifying against a former employer?
I’m pretty sure that’s where we left off yesterday. Let me check my notes. ✅give HR a coronary about ways to get fired (clickbait!), ✅blog about that 11th Cir. decision, ✅Day 1 “Manager Exception”; Day 2 “past employment,” ✅become their lord and savior (sacrilegious?) advocate. Yesterday, we explored a case…
Hold up! Is there an “HR manager” exception that allows employers to retaliate against HR?
Last night, I read this recent decision from a three-judge panel on the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals. It involves a human resources manager who claimed that her current employer fired her after it learned that she had earlier given deposition testimony in a pregnancy discrimination lawsuit against her former…
Two different termination letters lead to one discrimination lawsuit and zero luck for the plaintiff
The general rule in employment law is that an employer’s inconsistencies and contradictions breathe life into discrimination claims. But there are some exceptions. Proving pretext. For example, last night, I read this federal court decision involving an employee fired shortly after complaining to HR about an offensive comment from a…
Without this key element, you can kiss that retaliation claim goodbye
A plaintiff asserting a retaliation claim against his employer must establish three elements: A protected activity (such as complaining about discrimination), A materially adverse employment action (such as a termination of employment), and A connection between the first and second element (i.e., an employer fired him for complaining about discrimination)…
Is this the worst batch of retaliatory emails I’ve ever read? Maybe.
Print this post if you want to discourage your managers and supervisor from putting dumb sh*t in emails that might one day get shown to a jury and end up costing your business a mint. Last night, I read this opinion from a federal judge in Wisconsin. It’s about an…
“Liberal” Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer is retiring. Here are three times he joined “conservative” justices when deciding employment law cases.
Yesterday, several news outlets reported that Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer will retire at the end of this term. President Bill Clinton appointed Justice Breyer in 1994. Justice Breyer sided with OSHA and HHS in the vaccine mandate cases earlier this month. Indeed, Breyer is considered one of the more…
The EEOC updated its COVID-19 guidance again with new information on retaliation
Image Credit: finger pointing by BomSymbols from the Noun Project While nerds like me were flooding LinkedIn with status updates about Sixth Circuit this and OSHA ETS that, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission was hosting a secret “virtual dialogue” with the employer Illuminati about retaliation updating its COVID-19 Technical…