Yesterday's New York Times article outlines how difficult it is to prove age discrimination under the federal Age Discrimination in Employment Act that was enacted by Congress in 1967. However, the article is wrong in terms of the legal standard to prove age discrimination under the federal law. When referring to the U.S. Supreme Court's Gross case, the article says that an age discrimination victim is required to prove that his/her age was the sole motivating factor; this is not true. In fact, a subsequent U.S. Supreme Court case ruled that federal statutes than contain the phrase "because of" means that an age discrimination victim...
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Employment Attorneys Serving Northern and Central New Jersey
July 26, 2017
The federal 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia yesterday overturned the dismissal of an in-house patent lawyer's claim that he was fired because he refused to participate in conduct that would have violated the New Jersey Rules of Professional Conduct governing attorneys and the rules of the United States Patent and Trademark Office. In that case, a French beauty company required patent in-house counsel to satisfy a quota of patent applications which if not met, would result in termination. Plaintiff objected that he could not submit applications that did not have a good faith basis to be patentable which violated NJ RPC’s...
Read More Category: Whistleblower Retaliation, Wrongful Discharge
July 24, 2017
The New York Times just published an article on how GoDaddy is trying to eliminate sexism in the workplace. This is the same company whose advertising was notoriously salacious and degrading to women. With the hiring of CEO Blake Irving, the company has engaged in a campaign that looks at everything including criteria for performance evaluations that disfavor women to changing job descriptions that favored implicit male aggression. To see what GoDaddy is doing, first click on the title of this blog and then click on the word, article.
The tech industry is notorious for its sexist and ageist ways. If you are employed in the...
Read More July 17, 2017
The Third Circuit Court of Appeals (covering New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware and the Virgin Islands) ruled last week that a supervisor's use of the "n" word while threatening to fire African American employees is sufficient to allow a lawsuit to proceed under federal civil rights statutes. The appellate decision reversed the trial court's dismissal of the case and stated that the district court relied on the wrong legal standard when doing so. Click on the decision to see why the court ruled as it did.
If you believe that remarks in the workplace about you and your status are so severe as to make your work environment hostile...
Read More July 07, 2017
Elizabeth Spiers, founder of The Insurrection, who is not a lawyer but well versed in the IT field had an uncanny take that sexual harassers who selectively harass some women but not others should not be let off the hook. She is correct in her assessment that this is no defense when it comes to prosecuting sexual harassment cases. Her article, which is published on Linked-In, can be be viewed here.
The tech industry's reputation as a young "bro" culture has been born out in cases that we have litigated against tech companies. This is especially true with regard to female employees and older employees of both genders. If you...
Read More June 29, 2017
In 2010, Congress passed the Dodd Frank Act which in part was designed to expand legal protection to whistleblowing employees of publicly traded companies who disclose, object to or refuse to participate in conduct that violates federal securities laws. On June 26, 2017, the United States Supreme Court agreed to hear an appeal from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco to decide whether the Dodd Frank Act protects a whistleblowing employee who objects to federal securities laws violations to company management but not to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Thus, the Supreme Court will resolve conflicting rulings...
Read More June 09, 2017
So far, it appears the the EEOC during the Trump Presidency will emphasize enforcing the federal Age Discrimination in Employment Act which prohbits age discrimination against employees over 40 years old. See, Age Discrimination Next Up on EEOC’s Radar – Workforce Magazine. Hopefully, this is not just window dressing but real action. Studies by labor economists and the Federal Reserve Bank in San Francisco have found that older job candidates, and in particular women in their 50's, have a much tougher time even in obtaining job interviews than younger job candidates. See, http://www.frbsf.org/economic-research/publications/economic-...
Read More Category: Discrimination, Wrongful Discharge
May 23, 2017
Prospective clients frequently call our office seeking to pursue legal action because they were terminated while on disability leave. While calling us is certainly the correct first-step in this situation, not all employers violate the law when they terminate an employee who is out on disability leave and the simple fact of receipt of short term disability benefits does not prohibit termination. For example, if an employer is doing a reorganization and your position is legitimately eliminated, you are not protected simply because you are out on disability leave.
The first question to ask in determining whether your employer can...
Read More May 16, 2017
The attorneys at Green Savits have handled many whistleblower cases on behalf of police officers, doctors, corporate senior management, sales employees and others. So when we observed the firing of FBI Director James Comey, we immediately recognized the classic elements of whistleblower cases being played out on the national stage. The Comey firing is instructive on how whistleblower cases are proven.
When President Donald Trump fired FBI Director Comey, various reasons were given to justify the decision. First, the Trump Administration’s press secretaries said the decision was based on now former Director’s Comey public...
Read More May 15, 2017
The May 14, 2017 New York Times Sunday Business Section ran an in-depth feature article exploring how employers are requiring employees more and more to sign non-compete agreements. As the article points out, employers use to reserve the use of non-compete agreements for senior management. That has changed recently and has spread to the lowest rung employees. Because court battles over the validity of non-compete agreement require a lot of attorney time, attorneys who represent employees must charge on the hour and most employees cannot afford to pay those fees. One or two of the employees interviewed in the Times article went...
Read More Category: Employee Contracts, Restrictive Covenants
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