California Employment Law Notes

Subscribe to California Employment Law Notes via RSS

We invite you to review our newly-posted September 2015 California Employment Law Notes, a comprehensive review of the latest and most significant developments in California employment law. The highlights include:

…

We invite you to review our newly-posted July 2015 California Employment Law Notes, a comprehensive review of the latest and most significant developments in California employment law. The highlights include:

…

Higgins-Williams v. Sutter Med. Found., 237 Cal. App. 4th 78 (2015)

Michaelin Higgins-Williams worked as a clinical assistant in Sutter’s Shared Services Department. Higgins-Williams reported to her treating physician that she was stressed because of interactions at work with human resources and her manager. Her physician diagnosed Higgins-Williams with “adjustment disorder with anxiety,” and Sutter granted her a stress-related leave of absence of slightly

…

EEOC v. Abercrombie & Fitch Stores, Inc., 575 U.S. ___, 135 S. Ct. 2028 (2015)

Samantha Elauf, a practicing Muslim, wore a headscarf when she interviewed for a job with Abercrombie & Fitch. Although the headscarf was not discussed during the interview, the store allegedly decided not to offer Elauf a position after speculating that Elauf had probably worn the headscarf for religious reasons

…

Hirst v. City of Oceanside, 236 Cal. App. 4th 774 (2015)

Kimberli Hirst, an employee of American Forensic Nurses, Inc., sued the City of Oceanside after she was allegedly sexually harassed by an Oceanside police officer while providing phlebotomist services on behalf of the Oceanside Police Department. A jury awarded Hirst $1.5 million, which the trial court reduced to $1.25 million. In its motion

…

Glatt et al. v. Fox Searchlight Pictures, Inc. et al., 2015 WL 4033018 (2d Cir. 2015)

Plaintiffs Eric Glatt and Alexander Footman were retained as unpaid interns on the Fox Searchlight-distributed film Black Swan; Plaintiff Eden Antalik interned at Fox Searchlight’s corporate offices in New York City. Glatt and Footman sued for unpaid wages (minimum wage and overtime) under the federal Fair Labor

…

Teamsters Local Union No. 117 v. Washington Dep’t of Corrections, 2015 WL 3634711 (9th Cir. 2015)

In the face of repeated instances of sexual abuse and misconduct by prison guards in its women’s prisons, the state of Washington determined that a primary driver was the lack of female correctional officers to oversee female offenders and administer sensitive tasks such as observing inmates showering and

…

Parrish v. Latham & Watkins LLP, 2015 WL 3933988 (Cal. Ct. App. 2015)

In a prior litigation, FLIR Systems, Inc. and Indigo Systems Corp. (collectively, “FLIR”) brought suit against their former employees, William Parrish and E. Timothy Fitzgibbons (the “Former Employees”), for, among other things, misappropriation of trade secrets. The Former Employees defeated the claims and then obtained a ruling that the misappropriation of

…

Cifuentes v. Costco Wholesale Corp., 2015 WL 3932948 (Cal. Ct. App. 2015)

Carlos Cifuentes won a judgment for lost wages against his former employer, Costco. Costco withheld federal and state payroll taxes from the award in response to which Cifuentes claimed the judgment was not satisfied, citing a 1992 appellate court opinion holding that an employer is not required to withhold payroll taxes from

…

Elonis v. United States, 575 U.S. ___, 135 S. Ct. 2001 (2015)

Anthony Douglas Elonis (aka “Tone Dougie”) posted on Facebook various self-styled rap lyrics containing graphically violent language and imagery concerning his wife (who had left him), co-workers, a kindergarten class and state and federal law enforcement. Although Elonis interspersed his posts with disclaimers about the First Amendment and statements that the lyrics

…