The Chartwell Chronicles: Employment Law
Managing the Size and Structure of Your Post-Pandemic Workforce
#WorkforceWednesday: OSHA ETS on Hold, Retaliation Claims Increase, "Vaccination Ambassadors" - Employment Law This Week®
In Croke v. VuPoint System Ltd., 2024 ONCA 354, the Court of Appeal for Ontario (OCA) upheld the Superior Court of Justice – Ontario (SCJ)’s summary judgment decision that an employee’s refusal to comply with their employer’s...more
The Court of Appeal for Ontario (OCA) recently held that an employee may be awarded aggravated damages for an employer’s bad-faith conduct during the employee’s dismissal even in the absence of medical evidence identifying a...more
The Ontario Court of Appeal recently held that an employee’s failure to meet COVID-19 vaccination requirements imposed by a third party amounted to frustration of the employment contract. As a result, there was no obligation...more
The Michigan Supreme Court’s recent ruling in the case of Miller v. Department of Corrections expands the scope of retaliation claims under the Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act (ELCRA). This decision could have important...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit affirmed a district court’s decision that “but-for” is the proper causation standard for FMLA retaliation claims addressed within the...more
Sooner or later all employers, including those in the hospitality industry, are faced with sick employees. Apart from the costs, this also brings with it the necessary operational hassle for employers; for example,...more
The recent decision of the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench, Wisser v CEM International Management Consultants Ltd., 2022 ABQB 414, determined that the oppression remedy under the Alberta Business Corporations Act (“ABCA”),...more
In a recent case issued by the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico (“the Court”), the Court addressed the standard and level of proof that must be presented by employers when raising as an affirmative defense a corporate...more
On March 11, 2022, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed summary judgment, dismissing a Texas city employee’s claim that he had been unlawfully terminated from his job because of his age. The Fifth...more
In a successful wrongful dismissal claim for $18,647, the Supreme Court of British Columbia in Austin v Kitsumkalum First Nation, 2020 BCSC 2298, awarded the employee an additional $15,000 for aggravated damages because the...more
On December 17, 2021, Meehan v. Medical Information Technology, Inc., the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts (“SJC”) held that an employee’s filing a rebuttal to information placed in their personnel file that could...more
On December 17, 2021, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) ruled that an employee discharged for submitting a written rebuttal to his employer in response to the placement of negative information in his personnel...more
Civil litigation by private parties alleging False Claims Act (“FCA”) violations related to Paycheck Protection Program (“PPP”) fraud appears to be heating up. On September 22, 2021, a former restaurant manager filed a...more
In a case of first impression, the Superior Court of Pennsylvania has determined that employees can sue their employers for claims under the Pennsylvania Medical Marijuana Act (MMA). Palmiter v. Commonwealth Health Sys.,...more
A Texas federal court dismissed a lawsuit brought by hospital employees who challenged their employer’s requirement that they receive the COVID-19 vaccine or be terminated, rejecting the argument that the requirement set the...more
To date, few decisions in Canada have considered whether the amount of the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) employees receive after their job termination should be deducted from their damages in lieu of common law...more
For employers, the decision to terminate an employee is never an easy one. Ripple effects, including the burden on remaining staff and a potential decrease in productivity, can be felt across the organization. Even in the...more
Fisher Phillips’ COVID-19 Employment Litigation Tracker continues to report that the healthcare industry is the hardest hit by COVID-19 employment litigation. As of the beginning of June, more than one in five of every...more
On March 3, 2021, in Rohrer v. Oswego Cove, LLC, the Oregon Court of Appeals reversed the lower court’s dismissal of an employee’s common-law wrongful discharge claim for seeking legal advice about her employment....more
In Abrams v. RTO Asset Management, 2020 NBCA 57 (Abrams), the New Brunswick Court of Appeal considered an employee’s appeal of a decision dismissing his action for damages in lieu of reasonable notice upon his job termination...more
Following the lead of other courts around the country, a Pennsylvania state court has held that employees can bring lawsuits against their employers asserting claims under the state’s medical marijuana law. Palmiter v....more
Seyfarth Synopsis: Vaccinations have been widely debated over the past few years, leaving employers unclear about their obligations to accommodate employees whose religious beliefs conflict with them. Recently the U.S. Court...more
In a recent decision, the Appellate Court of Illinois rejected a school board’s decision to terminate a tenured teacher for misconduct despite a hearing officer’s finding that there was insufficient evidence of cause for...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: The DOL’s ARB rejected an employee’s SOX retaliation claim where he inadvertently provided information to his employer and only “hinted” that he was filing a SOX-protected complaint. The ARB seems unwilling...more
Under the federal Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA), employers are prohibited from taking adverse employment actions against employees because they are servicemembers or are obligated to...more