Justia Labor & Employment Law Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff filed suit against his employer, the Sheriff of Broward County, under 42 U.S.C. 1983 for declaratory and injunctive relief, alleging that the Sheriff retaliated against him for exercising his First Amendment rights by suspending him with pay pending an investigation into his conduct.The Eleventh Circuit affirmed the district court's dismissal under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), because plaintiff failed to allege that he suffered an adverse employment action. In this case, plaintiff filed suit against the Sheriff only five days after he was suspended with pay in accordance with the governing collective bargaining agreement. The court agreed with the district court that a five-day suspension with pay does not constitute adverse action for purposes of a First Amendment retaliation claim. The court explained that such a temporally-limited suspension pending an investigation into alleged misconduct would not deter a reasonable person from exercising his First Amendment rights. View "Bell v. Sheriff of Broward County" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court's order compelling arbitration in a putative class action brought by Massachusetts residents who have worked as Uber drivers, seeking a preliminary injunction prohibiting Uber from classifying drivers in Massachusetts as independent contractors, as well as an order directing Uber to classify its drivers as employees and comply with Massachusetts wage laws.The panel concluded that Uber drivers, as a nationwide class of workers, do not fall within the so-called "interstate commerce" exemption to mandatory arbitration under the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA). The panel explained that Uber drivers, even when crossing state lines or transporting passengers to airports, are merely conveying interstate passengers between their homes and their destination in the normal course of their independent local service. Therefore, interstate movement cannot be said to be a central part of the class members' job description. The panel found the analysis of the minority of district courts that have found to the contrary unpersuasive.The panel also concluded that plaintiffs' claims and requested injunctive relief are arbitrable by the terms of the arbitration agreement and plaintiffs' requested injunctive relief would have upended the status quo rather than maintained it. Therefore, the district court properly addressed the motion to compel arbitration first.Finally, the panel concluded that the injunctive relief requested, reclassification of drivers' status from "independent contractors" to "employees" is not a public injunctive relief that may be allowed to them to avoid arbitration. In this case, the relief sought by plaintiffs is overwhelmingly directed at plaintiffs and other rideshare drivers, and they would be the primary beneficiaries of access to overtime and minimum wage laws. View "Capriole v. Uber Technologies, Inc." on Justia Law

Dr. Islam, a tenured electrical and computer engineering professor at University of Michigan, received an additional appointment at UM’s medical school. Upon joining the faculty, he executed an employment agreement and agreed to abide by UM’s bylaws, which provide that patents issued or acquired as a result of or in connection with administration, research, or other educational activities supported directly or indirectly by funds administered by the University and all revenues derived therefrom are the property of the University. Property rights in computer software resulting from activities that received no support are the property creator. In cases involving both University-supported activity and independent activity, property rights in resulting work products are owned as agreed upon before any exploitation thereof.In 2012, Islam took an unpaid leave-of-absence from UM to start a new Biomedical Laser Company. During his leave, Islam filed provisional patent applications. Upon returning to UM, he filed non-provisional applications claiming priority to those provisional applications. Islam later assigned the patent rights to Omni. Those patents are ancestors of the patents-in-suit, which are not directly related to Islam’s teaching. UM refused to confirm Islam’s ownership of his inventions, noting the expenditure of medical school funds to support the cost of Islam’s space, time required to process Islam’s appointment to the medical school, and “medical school faculty partners who have helped springboard ideas.”In 2018, Omni sued Apple, asserting infringement. The district court denied Apple’s motion to dismiss for lack of standing. The Federal Circuit affirmed. UM’s bylaws did not effectuate a present automatic assignment of Islam’s patent rights. View "Omni Medsci, Inc. v. Apple Inc." on Justia Law

Plaintiff Armando Rios, Jr., a Hispanic male, was hired by defendant Meda Pharmaceutical, Inc. (Meda) in May 2015. Defendant Tina Cheng-Avery was Rios’s direct supervisor. Rios claimed Cheng-Avery twice directed a racially-derogatory term toward him at their place of work. Rios says he reported her comments to Meda’s Director of Human Resources after each incident. Cheng-Avery placed Rios on probation in February 2016 for poor performance. Meda fired Rios in June 2016. Rios filed a complaint alleging in part that defendants violated the Law Against Discrimination (LAD) by creating a hostile work environment. The trial court granted defendants’ motion for summary judgment, finding that no rational factfinder could conclude Cheng-Avery’s alleged comments were sufficiently severe or pervasive to create a hostile work environment. The Appellate Division affirmed. The New Jersey Supreme Court found that the remarks from the perspective of a reasonable Hispanic employee in Rios’s position, a rational jury could conclude the demeaning and contemptuous slurs, allegedly uttered by a direct supervisor, were sufficiently severe or pervasive to create a hostile work environment in violation of the LAD. The Appellate Division was reversed and the matter remanded for further proceedings. View "Rios v. Meda Pharmaceutical, Inc." on Justia Law

In June 2020, weeks after George Floyd was killed at the hands of a Minneapolis Police Officer, the New Jersey Attorney General issued two Directives calling for the release of the names of law enforcement officers who commit disciplinary violations that result in the imposition of “major discipline” -- termination, demotion, or a suspension of more than five days. A summary of the misconduct and the sanction imposed also had to be disclosed. In this appeal, the issues presented for the New Jersey Supreme Court came from challenges brought against the Directives by five groups representing state and local officers. The Appellate Division found that the Directives did not violate constitutional guarantees of due process or equal protection. The court also rejected claims that the Directives violate the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), and that they impaired appellants’ right to contract and violate their constitutional right to collective negotiations. Finally, the appellate court concluded the Directives were not arbitrary, capricious, unreasonable, or against public policy. The Supreme Court found the Directives were consistent with legislative policies and rested on a reasonable basis. The Court did not find merit in the bulk of the remaining challenges, except for one that required "more careful attention:" Officers subjected to major discipline for the past twenty years said they were promised that their names would not be released, and that they relied on that promise in resolving disciplinary accusations. Essentially they asked the State to stand by promises they claimed were made throughout the prior twenty years. Resolution of that issue will require judicial review to decide if the elements of the doctrine of promissory estoppel were met. The identities of officers subject to major discipline since the Directives were issued in June 2020 could be disclosed; going forward, future disciplinary sanctions could be disclosed in the same manner. View "In re Attorney General Law Enforcement Directive Nos. 2020-5 and 2020-6" on Justia Law

Plaintiff Mary Richter, a longtime type 1 diabetic and teacher, experienced a hypoglycemic event in a classroom. She sustained serious and permanent life-altering injuries. Richter filed a claim under the Law Against Discrimination (LAD), alleging that her employer failed to accommodate her pre-existing disability. The issues this appeal presented for the New Jersey Supreme Court were: (1) whether Richter was required to establish an adverse employment action -- such as a demotion, termination, or other similarly recognized adverse employment action -- to be able to proceed with an LAD failure-to-accommodate disability claim; and (2) whether plaintiff’s claim was barred by the “exclusive remedy provision” of the Worker’s Compensation Act (WCA) because she recovered workers’ compensation benefits. The Supreme Court held an adverse employment action was not a required element for a failure-to-accommodate claim under the LAD. Further, plaintiff’s LAD claim based on defendants’ alleged failure to accommodate her pre-existing diabetic condition was not barred by the WCA, and plaintiff need not filter her claim through the required showings of the “intentional wrong exception.” View "Richter v. Oakland Board of Education" on Justia Law

The Unemployment Insurance Agency (UIA) brought actions against claimants Frank Lucente and Michael Herzog, respectively, to appeal the decisions of the Michigan Compensation Appellate Commission (MCAC) that claimants were not required to pay restitution and fraud penalties under the Michigan Employment Security Act (MESA) despite the fact that they had improperly received unemployment benefits after becoming employed full-time and providing inaccurate responses to certification questions concerning their new employment. The Michigan Supreme Court found the Court of Appeals correctly held that MCL 421.62 authorized the UIA to issue original fraud and restitution determinations that were not subject to the constraints of MCL 421.32a. However, it erred by concluding that the UIA’s decision to issue “redeterminations” in these cases was of no substantive effect. "The UIA must issue an original determination alleging fraud, and its failure to do so was grounds for invalidating the 'redeterminations' in this case. On this issue, the payment of benefits cannot serve as an original 'determination' on the alleged fraud, and the UIA’s issuance of determinationless 'redeterminations' deprives claimants of their right to protest. When UIA-initiated review of a past-paid benefit results in a decision that the claimant received benefits during a period of ineligibility or disqualification and owes restitution as a result, the UIA must begin with an original 'determination' as described in MCL 421.62. The Court of Appeals' judgment was reversed and the matter remanded for further proceedings. View "Michigan Unemployment Ins. Agy. v. Lucente" on Justia Law

Sanchez oil was sued by a subcontractor of a contractor for alleged violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). After unsuccessfully requesting indemnification from Crescent, which hired the subcontractor, Sanchez filed a third-party complaint alleging breach of contract for Crescent's failure to indemnify Sanchez and failure to comply with the FLSA.The Fifth Circuit reversed the district court's denial of Sanchez's motion for summary judgment and grant of Crescent's motion, finding material fact issues as to whether the subcontractor was an "independent contractor" or otherwise was exempt from the FLSA. The court also found material fact issues regarding whether Crescent unreasonably withheld consent to the settlement. The court remanded for further proceedings. View "Sanchez Oil & Gas Corp. v. Crescent Drilling & Productions, Inc." on Justia Law

Alaska Communications provides telecommunications services throughout Alaska and in Oregon. While most of the company’s employees are based in Alaska, some are in Oregon. The union that represents a majority of the company’s employees did not previously represent any of the Oregon-based employees and sought to hold a representation election among a subset of the Oregon-based employees. The National Labor Relations Board certified a voting group that differed slightly from the petitioned-for unit, 29 U.S.C. 157, and that group voted to join the preexisting bargaining unit. The petitioned-for unit encompassed 12 Cable Systems Group employees, including both Holmes and Pavlenko. The Board excluded those individuals as being supervisors and added the only two employees who had not been included in the petition, finding that their exclusion “would unduly fragment the workforce and render the proposed Voting Group an irrational and indistinct one.”The D.C. Circuit rejected the company’s challenge to the certification of the voting group. The D.C. Circuit ruled in favor of the Board. The Board permissibly adjusted the composition of the voting group and permissibly determined that the group shares a community of interest with the preexisting bargaining unit it voted to join. View "Alaska Communications Systems Holdings, Inc. v. National Labor Relations Board" on Justia Law

After plaintiff, who was employed by Hulcher Services, lost several fingers at work in an accident at the railyard, he filed suit against Norfolk, the railyard owner, under the Federal Employers' Liability Act (FELA).The Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of Norfolk, concluding that plaintiff failed to show that he was an employee of Norfolk and thus he could not recover under FELA. The court explained that plaintiff failed to show that Norfolk controlled the performance of his work or retained the right to do so. View "Wheeler v. Norfolk Southern Railway Co." on Justia Law