They can’t all begin with a priest, minister and a rabbi walking into a bar. Then again, it’s “Religious Accommodation Tuesday” here at The Employer Handbook. So, after the jump, we’ll discuss the test to determine whether an employee may lawfully don religious items at work and find out whether the hospital worker in this case has a potential religious discrimination claim (Hint: he does).
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Documentation is good; smoking-gun emails from the HR Manager not so much.
After the jump, I’ve got a few doozies which now have a financial institution going to trial on a former employee’s age-discrimination and Family and Medical Leave Act claims.
And if anyone wants to get me this iPad case for Christmas…
Wait, what was I supposed to be writing about? Oh yeah, national-origin discrimination. I’ll get it together for you after the jump…
That’s right folks. It’s time for another edition of “Fact or Fiction” a/k/a “Quick Answers to Quick Questions” a/k/a QATQQ f/k/a “I don’t feel like writing a long blog post.”
Under the Americans with Disabilities Act, an employer is required to provide a reasonable accommodation, if doing so will allow a disabled employee to perform the essential functions of his job. Could this mean having to create a brand new position for a disabled employee?
Nope. A federal appellate court underscored this last week (opinion here) when if affirmed a lower-court decision to dismiss a plaintiff’s claims under the ADA that his former employer had failed to accommodate his disability:
What if I told you that a female black employee was called “monkey” and “nappy head Raggedy Ann” at work?
What if I then told you that the employee subsequently sued in New Jersey state court; quite possibly the most plaintiff-friendly jurisdiction in the U.S. — next to California?
And guess what? She lost. Oh my!
What the heck happened and what can employers learn from this recent decision? Find out after the jump…
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On behalf of an illiterate man, the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) investigated a Charge of Discrimination against a MD employer, which allegedly had a literacy policy that violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (by discriminating against qualified individuals with learning disabilities). As part of its investigation, the EEOC served an extremely broad subpoena on the employer. The employer fought the subpoena hard. Ultimately; however, it learned that the EEOC has the power.
You’ll learn too (and figure out why this post has a picture of Ric Flair)…after the jump…
Sounds like a bad batch of Pennyroyal Tea. Just another Tuesday here at the ole Handbook.
<div style=”text-align: right;”>The San Francisco Chronicle is reporting here that Courtney Love, Kurt Cobain’s widow, is reuniting the band ** thank you for sparing our ear holes ** being sued by a former assistant seeking, among other things, unpaid overtime. The plaintiff also claims that Love asked her to perform voodoo rituals ** not yet, next paragraph ** unethical duties such as hiring a hacker and forging legal correspondence. The San Francisco Employment Lawyer Blog has more on this case here.
From Hole to holes in a doll pin-cushion, with a hat-tip to @ChaimBook, the Madison St. Clair Record reports here that a Wisconsin woman is suing her former employer for sexual harassment and retaliation. The plaintiff claims that she was forced to look at nude female magazines, calendars and sexually explicit language used by her co-workers and direct supervisor. Fairly standard sexual-harassment fare. What makes this case blogworthy is that, after she complained, the plaintiff allegedly suffered retaliation in the form of two voodoo dolls in her desk, one of which had a black pin stuck into her chest.
I was reading this Third Circuit decision yesterday about an employee who got demoted for sleeping on the job, and all I could think of was Homer Simpson. For not unlike Homer J., a nuclear safety technician, this employee was responsible for monitoring his plant’s equipment to prevent malfunctions that could result in explosions, property damage, injuries, and fatalities. Except, unlike Homer, the former employee was allegedly found sleeping on the floor of his office, with a pillow, blankets, and an alarm clock nearby. Now that’s what I call an all-out Costanza! All that’s missing here are the empty calories and male curiosity, eh Georgie?
Instead, we are left with a baseless age-discrimination lawsuit from a employee, claiming that when he was demoted, it wasn’t for sleeping on the job. Rather, it was because of his age and an unwritten policy “to get rid of older employees,” premised upon a single stray remark and slipshod investigation into the sleeping incident.
Smell that? Yeah, me too… (And it’s not what The Rock is cookin’)
To prove age discrimination, an employee must demonstrate, at a minimum, that the employment action taken occurred under circumstances that give rise to an inference of discrimination. One stray remark and a poor investigation — even if true — do not indicate that age was the motivating reason behind an employment decision, which is the burden that a plaintiff must meet to prove age discrimination.
What’s the lesson to be learned here? If you are going to sleep at work, don’t get caught, of course. Or maybe do your sleeping at home…in a bed.
I heard that there was some Supreme Court decision yesterday about healthcare. Want the scoop? Google it.
They zig, I’ll zag with the scoop on some other pending employment-law legislation of which employers should take note…after the jump…
When Harold Wasek signed on to work at an oil rig in Pennsylvania, he had no idea what lay in store for him, especially when one of his co-workers discovered that Wasek would get easily riled with sexually explicit stories, jokes, fantasies, and names.
- “You’ve got such a pretty mouth.”
- “Boy you have pretty lips.”
- “You know you like it, sweetheart.”
Wasek complained to his supervisor. But the harassment worsened. He was touched in a sexual manner: grabbing his buttocks, poking him in the rear with a hammer handle and something described as a long sucker rod.
So Wasek sued claiming sex discrimination. And he lost. Why? Because his harasser was a straight man.
Seriously.
I’ll explain after the jump…
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