Follow Us
twittergoogle_pluslinkedinrssyoutube
Subscribe to the BT Currents Blog

By signing up, you agree to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.

Recent Posts
The Legal Stuff
this is the image
BT Currents - Hot Topics in Employment Law
title
Home/

Articles posted by Bill Nolan

(Page 12)
0 0

12 Aug 2013 Sixth Circuit: No Way to Agree to Shorten FLSA Statute of Limitations

Fair Labor Standards Act | Bill Nolan

In 2004, a Sixth Circuit decision, Thurman v. DaimlerChrysler, drew much attention by upholding in the context of a Title VII and state law discrimination claim a provision on the employer’s employment application that read: I agree that any claim or lawsuit relating to my service with [DaimlerChrysler] or any of its subsidiaries must be filed no more than six (6) months after the date of the employment action that is the subject of the claim or lawsuit. I waive any statute of limitations to…

READ MORE
0 0

25 Jul 2013 Associational Discrimination: Perfectly Healthy Employee Can Have Disability Claim

Employment Discrimination | Bill Nolan

A recent Massachusetts Supreme Court decision highlights a form of discrimination that employers may not always remember – associational discrimination. Associational discrimination is workplace discrimination against one for his relationship with another, and is expressly recognized in the Americans with Disabilities Act. In this case, the court recognized such a claim under a counterpart state law. In Flagg v. Alimed, Inc., a long-time employee’s wife had surgery for a brain tumor and the employee needed extra time to care for his children. The employee’s manager told him “to…

READ MORE
0 0

19 Jul 2013 Straying from Past Practice in Investigation Raises Retaliation Risk

Employment Discrimination | Bill Nolan

A recent 7th Circuit case demonstrates the importance of carefully designing workplace investigations to account for a variety of potential claims. In Hobgood v. Illinois Gaming Board, a gaming board employee filed suit against his employer alleging unlawful retaliation in violation of Title VII and the First Amendment. The employee was terminated for helping his coworker organize and research a suit against the gaming board, citing widespread corruption in its hiring policies. Additionally, the employee supplied two confidential documents supporting the coworker’s claims. The coworker’s lawsuit…

READ MORE
0 0

15 Jul 2013 Update: Still Legal to Fire the ‘Irresistible’ Employee in Iowa

Employment Discrimination | Bill Nolan

A few months ago we wrote about the Iowa Supreme Court decision holding that it was not gender discrimination for a dentist to fire his attractive assistant at his wife’s behest because she was deemed a threat to the dentist’s marriage. Last week we got to relive this case in the media (social and otherwise) when the court declined the employee’s motion asking the court to reconsider its position. While it is certainly the exception for courts to reverse their own decisions (the employee probably…

READ MORE
0 0

21 Jun 2013 The Witness Files: Deja Vu All Over Again in Workplace Investigations

Employment Discrimination | Bill Nolan

Over time, as lawyers and HR professionals and others conduct numerous workplace investigations, we find that, while each investigation is unique, we “meet” the same characters over and over. With that in mind, I am writing monthly posts on the i-Sight.com blog about those composite witnesses and strategies for dealing with them. The first post that I’ve authored, entitled “The Clueless, Yet Compliant, Accused,” features the supervisor who really does want to improve his clueless behavior (a relatively easy case in many respects); while the…

READ MORE
0 0

19 Jun 2013 Employers May Come Up, Um, Short Under ADA

Employment Discrimination | Bill Nolan

A decision last week from the U.S. District Court for Arizona highlights a point made previously in this space – for better or worse, the number of people protected by discrimination laws almost never goes down, rather we just keep adding protected classes and who is covered under them. In this decision, the Court opened the Pandora’s Box of possibly protecting short employees under the ADA. The case involves an allegedly bullying supervisor – accusing the plaintiff of mistakes that turned out to the supervisor’s…

READ MORE
0 0

13 May 2013 Gov. Christie The First to Stand Up to Social Media Legislation Wave?

Social Media and Technology | Bill Nolan

New Jersey’s legislature recently tried to make it the 8th state to restrict employers from requiring employees to provide social media passwords in the hiring and other employment processes. This trend, somewhat odd in that it addresses a problem that nobody seems to think actually exists (i.e. employers are not really requiring passwords of applicants), started approximately a year ago. New Jersey’s legislation arguably would have been the most restrictive such legislation to date. Governor Christie, however, vetoed the legislation, stating that he would like to see…

READ MORE
0 0

06 May 2013 Shy Bladder Syndrome Lawsuit Reminds: Applicants Get Reasonable Accommodation

Employee Health Issues | Bill Nolan

A recently filed Americans with Disabilities Act case alleges that an Iowa hospital refused to accommodate an applicant’s shy bladder syndrome. The condition is an anxiety condition that makes it difficult or impossible for an individual to urinate in non-private or other conditions. Jennifer Connor alleges that she suffers from this condition and was a qualified applicant for a position at the defendant hospital. Ms. Conner would normally run water or flush the toilet in order to be able to use a public restroom. For a mandatory drug test, she was…

READ MORE
0 0

01 Apr 2013 Increasing Discrimination Obligations Coming from State and Municipal Levels

Employment Discrimination | Bill Nolan

In this recent Metropreneur Columbus article, I talked about the long term trend for forms of discrimination to only increase.  Rarely since the passage of Title VII in 1964 has a cause of action for discrimination been taken away.  As discussed more in the article, current manifestations of this long term trend include laws at various levels to protect employees against discrimination on the basis of their sexual orientation or identity, or on the basis of their unemployed status. Many of these particular initiatives are on the…

READ MORE
0 0

04 Feb 2013 The More Things Change…

Employment Discrimination | Bill Nolan

When you do something for a long time, you start to see patterns. In employment law, one pattern is that the possible sources of employee-related liability only increase. For example, as our recent article from InsideCounsel discusses, employment law is continually adding “protected classes,” groups of people who are protected by a discrimination law. But the other pattern that goes along with that trend is that the advice to employers about how to handle performance, discipline, and termination situations rarely changes – make mission-related business…

READ MORE