Fired for threatening supervisor — now she’s suing
June 22, 2009 by Taylor HanniganPosted in: From the Courts, In this week's e-newsletter, Latest News & Views
It sounds pretty simple: An employee is fired after physically threatening her supervisor. So why didn’t the court toss her claim that the termination was discriminatory?
Background: After a student counselor at a community college suffered a brain injury in a car accident, her “ability to regulate her emotional responses” became impaired.
For a while, the college district provided the counselor with a job coach. But it later substituted supervisor feedback instead — over her objection.
Incident: After the job coach was pulled, a supervisor told the counselor she hadn’t worked the required number of hours in a recent week. The counselor responded by threatening to “kick [her] ass.” That led to her termination – and a lawsuit against the college district.
Claim: The college district violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by failing to accommodate her mental disability.
Result: The court rejected the college district’s bid to have the accommodation claim thrown out. Even if the threat was criminal conduct, it said, the counselor might be able to convince a jury that a job coach should have been required – and would have enabled her to do her job.
Cite: Menchaca v. Maricopa Community College Dist.
Did the court get it right? Tell us what you think in the comments section below.
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June 25th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
The court was correct. The Americans with Disabilities Act is very specific about this type of injury and disablity. The prudent action to take was to give the counselor more time to adjust. Performance records and documentation would be the action to be taken on this individual. Remember that this person was “fine” before all this happen. It was a “no brainer” that the adjustment was not being met. More time and consideration would have avoided this incident that now stains both the individual and school district. I do believe though that perhaps the counselor should attend anger management classes to continue to work. This would protect the school district and the person. One never knows the effects of a head injury until it is too late. HRM
June 27th, 2009 at 11:07 am
The court clearly indicated the way that the school should have proceeded. Prosecuting the criminal action would have been acceptable. It would have been far more damaging to the individual, but it would have been outside of the school and therefore, I think that is the trend that we will see more and more. As schools are hamstrung in dealing with matters internally, they will have only criminal and civil courts to turn to. Not a great way to go…
July 15th, 2009 at 5:40 pm
The schools HR department screwed-up. They should have known to call a lawyer as soon as they even considered terminating a person with a disability. My university has given up terminating anyone unless they are dead or will be incarcerated for more than a year.
April 22nd, 2010 at 5:03 pm
So… We are saying that it is OK to threaten a person with physical harm as long as you have a disability? That should never be acceptable. Is the school required to follow this person all around the campus in case she wants to attack a student at lunch or whatever? IF this person goes nova and comes to campus with a gun, I guess everyone will wring their hands at the loss of life but feel good that this womans rights were protected.