Employer retaliation cases reach U.S. Supreme Court
Legal News Center
Employers, managers, and supervisors wield enormous power in the workplace over the lives and wellbeing of their employees.
Congress has recognized that sometimes this power can be abused by managers who retaliate if they don't like something that employee has said or done.
This week, the US Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in two cases examining how, when – or even if – employees can fight back against such abuses of power. On Tuesday, the high court will examine whether a US postal worker can claim retaliation in a lawsuit under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act because she says her supervisor refused to let her return to her old job because he didn't like her personally. Instead, he hired a younger, less experienced worker.
On Wednesday, the justices will hear the case of a former assistant manager at a Cracker Barrel restaurant who alleges he was fired in retaliation for his repeated complaints about racial prejudice by his supervisor.
In both cases the laws cited do not explicitly authorize legal action in response to an act of retaliation. Lawyers for the employees say retaliation is a particularly virulent form of illegal discrimination and thus falls within the scope of the US's civil rights laws even when those laws don't specifically mention retaliation.
Lawyers for companies and supervisors counter that if Congress wanted to authorize lawsuits to punish acts of retaliation, it would have written it into each statute.
Related listings
-
Judge convicts ex-student in school plot
Legal News Center 02/15/2008[##_1L|1396302555.jpg|width="180" height="122" alt=""|_##]A Plymouth Superior Court judge wasted no time rendering a decision yesterday morning against Joseph Nee, a former Marshfield High student accused of plotting a Columbine-style ambush on the s...
-
Medicaid suit gains status as a class action
Legal News Center 02/14/2008[##_1L|1284988064.jpg|width="90" height="119" alt=""|_##]Thousands of Northeast Florida residents just became plaintiffs in a class action lawsuit they know nothing about. The lawsuit, filed last month in federal court in Fort Lauderdale, is alleging...
-
Class actions feel effects of Milberg case
Legal News Center 02/11/2008As famed class-action lawyer William S. Lerach steps before a federal judge in Los Angeles today to learn his sentence in a wide-ranging fraud and conspiracy probe, his misdeeds and those of former colleagues may be helping to alter the way securitie...
New Rochelle, New York Personal Injury Lawyers
If you or a loved one has been injured in an accident, contact Kommer, Bave & Ollman, LLP, in New Rochelle, New York, immediately. We can answer all your questions and work with you to determine if you have the grounds for a personal injury lawsuit. The attorneys at our firm are determined to resolve even the most difficult of cases. We will work closely with you to determine the best course of action to get your claim or case resolved in the most efficient way possible. We will fight for your right to compensation! No one should have to suffer a financial burden from the result of another person’s carelessness. The attorneys at Kommer, Bave & Ollman, LLP will aggressively fight to ensure that justice is served on your behalf.