The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 8-0 in favor of a former hospital lab technician who said he was fired due to his U.S. Army Reserve commitments, according to the Supreme Court decision.
Vincent Staub said his supervisor at Proctor Hospital in Peoria, Ill., put him on different shifts without notice in retaliation for an Army Reserve training schedule that disrupted the hospital department's schedule. Supervisors called the reserve obligations "a bunch of smoking and joking and a waste of taxpayers' money," according to the decision.
Mr. Staub was eventually fired after working at Proctor for 15 years. However, someone other than his supervisors carried out the firing, based on other grounds. Finding no connection between the discrimination and the firing, the appeals court in the case found for the hospital.
The Supreme Court disagreed with the appeals decision. "If a supervisor performs an act motivated by anti-military animus that is intended by the supervisor to cause an adverse employment action and if that act is a proximate cause of the ultimate employment action," then the hospital is liable, Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in the decision.
The high court is leaving it up to the lower courts to decide whether to grant a new trial or reinstate the original jury verdict in favor of Mr. Staub.
Read the Supreme Court's Decision on Staub v. Proctor Hospital
Read more coverage of employee relations:
- Labor Unions are Dead…or at Least on Life Support
- Nurses Happier Away From Hospitals, Nursing Homes
- Nurses at Kaiser Los Angeles Medical Center to Strike on Wednesday
Vincent Staub said his supervisor at Proctor Hospital in Peoria, Ill., put him on different shifts without notice in retaliation for an Army Reserve training schedule that disrupted the hospital department's schedule. Supervisors called the reserve obligations "a bunch of smoking and joking and a waste of taxpayers' money," according to the decision.
Mr. Staub was eventually fired after working at Proctor for 15 years. However, someone other than his supervisors carried out the firing, based on other grounds. Finding no connection between the discrimination and the firing, the appeals court in the case found for the hospital.
The Supreme Court disagreed with the appeals decision. "If a supervisor performs an act motivated by anti-military animus that is intended by the supervisor to cause an adverse employment action and if that act is a proximate cause of the ultimate employment action," then the hospital is liable, Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in the decision.
The high court is leaving it up to the lower courts to decide whether to grant a new trial or reinstate the original jury verdict in favor of Mr. Staub.
Read the Supreme Court's Decision on Staub v. Proctor Hospital
Read more coverage of employee relations:
- Labor Unions are Dead…or at Least on Life Support
- Nurses Happier Away From Hospitals, Nursing Homes
- Nurses at Kaiser Los Angeles Medical Center to Strike on Wednesday