Virginia Employer Law

Stray Remarks by De Facto Decisionmaker Support Discrimination Claim

When is an employer liable for “stray” remarks? How connected do the stray remarks need to be to the adverse employment action? Earlier this summer, the Second Circuit reversed a district court’s award of summary judgment to an employer on a discrimination claim involving stray remarks in a denial of tenure case where the remarks […]

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EEOC Rules– Sexual Orientation Discrimination Equals Sex Discrimination under Title VII

On July 15, 2015, the EEOC clarified that, at least for claims made against the federal government, all complaints of discrimination based on sexual orientation constitute sex discrimination claims under Title VII. Baldwin v. Foxx, Secretary, Dept. of Transportation, EEOC Appeal No. 0120133080. The case involved David Baldwin, an air traffic controller who filed an […]

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DOL casts wider net for misclassified independent contractors

The DOL is continuing in its initiative to address misclassification and make sure there are more employees and less independent contractors in the future. The Wage and Hour Division of the DOL issued Administrator’s Interpretation 2015-1: The Application of the Fair Labor Standards Act’s “Suffer or Permit” Standard in the Identification of Employees Who Are […]

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Get your story straight—employer’s change in explanation can be evidence of pretext

Yet again, an employer is burned by asserting inconsistent reasons for the termination of an employee.  In a recent case, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals found that an employee had presented sufficient evidence of an unlawful termination based on his use of FMLA leave where the employer offered differing stories as to the reason […]

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Big changes in overtime proposed

Earlier this week, the Department of Labor announced a proposed rule that will greatly expand overtime protections. One of the significant changes is that the white collar exemptions will no longer be applicable to a large group of salaried employees–those making less than $50,440 on an annual basis.

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Uber driver found to be employee and not independent contractor

A big issue facing Uber and other similar on-demand car service companies is whether their drivers are independent contractors or employees. This classification issue is tricky for employers of all types and sizes — as the lines aren’t always clear and the implications significant. Earlier this week, the California Labor Commissioner ruled against Uber, finding […]

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Transgender former police officer states a claim under Title VII-but fails to show sufficient evidence of discrimination

Last week, the district court ruled that although discrimination based on transgender status was a cognizable claim under Title VII, the plaintiff had failed to demonstrate that the rejection of her application to be part of a volunteer mounted patrol was discriminatory. Finkle v. Howard County, Maryland, Case No. SAG-13-3236 (D. Md. June 12, 2015).

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Shifting explanations result in employer liability in Title VII retaliation claim

So a supervisor offers a couple of different explanations for action taken against an employee—how much does that matter? Maybe quite a bit, according to an opinion issued by Judge Jackson last week. See Mohammed v. Central Driving Mini Storage, Inc., Case No. 2:13cv00469 (E.D. Va. 2015). In this case, the court awarded a former […]

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Employers face possible claims for failure to accommodate even where there is no actual knowledge of a need for accommodation

Back in March, I posted about the case before the United States Supreme Court involving a girl who claimed that she was discriminated against because of her religion when Abercrombie & Fitch didn’t hire her because of her headscarf. The Tenth Circuit had found that because the plaintiff did not inform Abercrombie before its hiring […]

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But we didn’t tell him to work off the clock -do we still have to pay overtime?

Many employers have been faced with this situation. An employee who is classified as non-exempt and so entitled to overtime decides to do some work from his home computer at night—maybe to score some brownie points with a hard-to-please supervisor or maybe to make up for a failure to get enough done during the workday. […]

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