California Employment Law Notes

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deVillers v. County of San Diego, 156 Cal. App. 4th 238 (2007)

Kristin Rossum, who was employed as a toxicologist for the County of San Diego, took toxic materials from the Office of Medical Examiner (“OME”) and used them to murder her husband, Greg deVillers. After Rossum was convicted of murdering deVillers, his survivors sued the County for negligently hiring Rossum and for breaching…

Bader v. Northern Line Layers, Inc., 503 F.3d 813 (9th Cir. 2007)

The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (“WARN”) requires employers to give employees at least 60 days’ notice in the event of a plant closing or mass layoff at a “single site of employment.” The issue in this case was whether the site of employment of the construction worker-plaintiffs was the company’s…

Ramanathan v. Bank of America, 155 Cal. App. 4th 1017 (2007)

Padmanabhan Ramanathan alleged he was discriminated against and harassed as a result of his religion (Hindu), race (Asian) and national origin. In its summary judgment motion, the Bank asserted that Ramanathan was a “Vice President” who served “at the pleasure” of the board of directors pursuant to the National Bank Act (12 U.S.C.…

Nilsson v. City of Mesa, 503 F.3d 947 (9th Cir. 2007)

Christine Nilsson applied for a position as a police officer with the City of Mesa, Arizona. In conjunction with her application, Nilsson signed a waiver of any and all claims against the police department. During the application process, Nilsson disclosed that she had been involved in an EEOC dispute with the Tempe police…

Metoyer v. Screen Actors Guild, 504 F.3d 919 (9th Cir. 2007)

SAG terminated the employment of Dr. Patricia Heisser Metoyer (SAG’s national executive director of affirmative action) after PricewaterhouseCoopers concluded she had authorized payment of $30,000 of funds available for Guild use to friends, business partners and her husband’s production company. Metoyer responded by filing a lawsuit alleging race discrimination, wrongful termination and retaliation…

Guglielmino v. McKee Foods Corp., 506 F.3d 696 (9th Cir. 2007)

Plaintiffs sued McKee Foods in this putative class action in state court, alleging violation of the California Labor Code, fraud, breach of contract and related claims. McKee timely removed the action to federal court and asserted that even though plaintiffs affirmatively alleged that the damages suffered by each of them were less than…

San Jose Constr., Inc. v. S.B.C.C., Inc., 155 Cal. App. 4th 1528 (2007)

Richard Foust was a project manager for San Jose Construction (“SJC”) for 4½ years before he became dissatisfied with his job and accepted a position at a higher salary with South Bay Construction (“South Bay”), one of SJC’s competitors. Foust believed that SJC’s clients would follow him to another company, so…

Reid v. Google, Inc., 155 Cal. App. 4th 1342 (2007)

Brian Reid, who was employed for fewer than two years as Google’s Director of Operations and its Director of Engineering, sued Google after his termination, alleging age and disability discrimination, intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress and related claims. Reid was 54 years old at the time of his termination. Although the trial…

Sumuel v. ADVO, Inc., 155 Cal. App. 4th 1099 (2007)

In this class action, Tiffany Sumuel and Rudy Halim sued ADVO for unpaid overtime, asserting that ADVO’s policy in California of not paying supplemental salary replacement benefits to its sick or disabled managers until after they supplied proof of receipt of SDI benefits violated the “salary basis test” applicable to determining exemption from overtime.…

United States v. Sutcliffe, 505 F.3d 944 (9th Cir. 2007)

Sutcliffe, a computer technician, was convicted of three counts of making interstate threats (via the Internet) to injure another and five counts of transferring social security numbers with the intent to aid and abet unlawful activity. Global Crossing terminated Sutcliffe’s employment shortly after he was hired because he had failed to provide his social…