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Discrimination / Harassment

‘Gender expression’ now protected in N.J.; check dress code

02/01/2007

If your organization’s dress code and grooming policies set different standards for males and females, discuss the policy with your employment law attorney. A new change in state law may prompt the need to remove any sex-specific requirements …

Delegating Wage-Setting Discretion to Branches Won’t Justify a Class-Action Lawsuit

02/01/2007

Recently, clever lawyers toyed with a new tactic, hoping to turn individual discrimination cases into nationwide class-action monsters. They’d find a single unhappy employee and sue on behalf of all similarly situated employees in a company’s subsidiaries …

Sex harassment investigator sued for giving bum advice

02/01/2007

New Jersey attorneys may be feeling their clients’ pain on a whole new level.  A recent district court ruling allowed an employee to sue the attorney who investigated her sexual harassment complaint (as well as her employer) …

Johnson & Johnson sued again, this time from the executive suite

02/01/2007

A former chief medical officer for Johnson & Johnson’s Ethicon Inc. has filed a retaliation and discrimination lawsuit, claiming the company fired him for voicing product safety concerns and pushing for product recalls …

Beware personal liability for COBRA, FMLA, state bias law

02/01/2007

As if life in HR weren’t hard enough, a federal court has clarified when you may be held individually liable for mistakes in administering anti-discrimination and benefit laws …

Reversing disciplinary decisions can spark bias lawsuit

02/01/2007

If you punished two employees for the same misdeed but only one asked you to reverse the decision, consider the legal ramifications first. If you grant “amnesty” to one employee but not the other, you could trigger a discrimination lawsuit …

Part-time, ‘as-needed’ employees can still sue for bias

02/01/2007

Employees can sue for discrimination if you illegally figure their race, sex, age, religion, disability or pregnancy status into their termination. That’s true even if an employee is a part-timer who works only a few hours on an as-needed basis …

Inheriting staff? Setting higher standards is perfectly legal

02/01/2007

If you’re part of a new management team bent on improving overall performance, don’t let lawsuit fears keep you from imposing higher standards on inherited staff …

College sues feds over the right to post Christians-only job ads

02/01/2007

Geneva College in Beaver Falls recently filed a lawsuit against federal and state labor officials after it was asked to strike a Christianity requirement from help-wanted ads before posting them on Team Pennsylvania CareerLink …

Irony: Motherhood Maternity settles pregnancy-bias suit

02/01/2007

The EEOC has signaled that it will aggressively pursue employers that discriminate against pregnant applicants or employees. One ironic example: Motherhood Maternity has agreed to pay $375,000 to settle a pregnancy discrimination and retaliation lawsuit …