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Unjustified “For Cause” Termination Leads to Significant Jury Award in Workplace Defamation Claim

The Appellate Court for the First District of Illinois recently upheld a jury verdict awarding the plaintiff $2 million dollars in compensatory damages and $6 million dollars in punitive damages for a workplace defamation claim.  Leyshon v. Diehl Controls North America, Inc., 2010 WL 5480668 (Ill. App. 1st …

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Supreme Court Expands Title VII to Prohibit Third Party Retaliation

Yesterday, the United States Supreme Court ruled that an employee may sue for retaliation where his employer took an adverse action against him in retaliation for his fiancee’s complaint of discrimination.  This decision provides much needed protection to the friends, family members, and loved ones of an individual who complains at work …

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Having trouble getting private health insurance because of a pre-existing condition?  You’re certainly not alone.  It is estimated that 15.9 percent of Americans are uninsured, many for precisely the same reason.  While President Obama’s health care legislation, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, explicitly prohibits denying an individual health insurance because of pre-existing conditions or a history of high …

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EEOC Extends ADA Protections to Employee Based on Weight

We have all heard the taglines and statistics regarding the obesity epidemic in this country.  Still, the plain reality is this: an increasing number of Americans are becoming overweight or obese.  A recent survey reports that 63.1% of adults in the U.S. were either overweight or obese in 2009 (of those, 36.6% …

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July 1, 2010 Marks a Day of Hope for Uninsured Americans with Preexisting Medical Conditions

Under the national health care reform bill signed into law by President Obama earlier this year, insurance companies will no longer be allowed to refuse to sell health insurance coverage or refuse to renew health insurance coverage because of an individual’s preexisting medical condition. However, this …

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What Employees Need to Know

The Baseline: Employee Rights Under COBRA, Generally

The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985 (“COBRA”) requires employers with 20 or more employees who offer health benefits to provide continued coverage to “qualified beneficiaries” for up to 18 months after a “qualifying event;” however, the employee must pay the entire premium. A “qualified beneficiary” is an individual …

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Tell your U.S. representative to help pass ENDA now!

Imagine getting fired. Not because you aren’t good at your job. Not because you show up late or slack off.

Imagine getting fired solely because you’re lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. In most states that is fully legal.

We are pushing for a vote on the bill that would end this injustice soon after …

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The EEOC announced last month that it was filing suit against Kelley Drye & Warren, an international law firm with its primary office in New York City, for paying its 70 year old+ lawyers much less than their younger counterparts.

According to the EEOC’s suit, Kelley Drye attorneys who practiced law after turning 70 years of age received dramatically reduced compensation …

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So we all know better than to eat up work time doing personal tasks, right (whether we actually follow that advice or not)?  And surely we can all safely assume that gambling is frowned upon in the workplace.  But for some reason, as the ides of March approach almost every office in the country starts rolling out the March Madness …

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The Vanishing Earned Bonus [Part I] – And How to Get it Back!

Every year, around this time we start to get calls from employees who have not only lost their jobs but have also been denied their year-end bonus, which so many families depend on in budgeting their lives.  Employers use all kinds of tricks to withhold what employees rightly feel …

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