posted on Tuesday, July 18, 2006 2:38 PM
by
Rod Satterwhite
No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
Check out this proof of the first law of employment litigation -- "No good deed goes unpunished". Plaintiff's job was to interview applicants for state health benefits, but due to agoraphobia and panic disorder could not meet with people face to face. The agency accommodated him by assigning him cases that could be handled entirely by phone, doing so for fifteen years. Plaintiff then applied for a promotion and was told that due to the absence of in-person interviewing experience he was not eligible, but if he were willing to undertake such duties he would be considered. This, needless to say, caused the hypersensitive plaintiff to go into a tail spin and leave work remaining on "stress leave" continuously since sometime in 2004. The jury of his peers awarded him over $6,000,000, proving the second law of employment litigation -- things in California are just different. The judge being "rational" and concerned about evident jury misconduct, reduced the award to $2,500,000. Plaintiff's counsel then asked the court to award $1,300,000 in fees by applying a multiplier, apparently for his extraordinarily good luck, thus proving the third law of employment litigation -- a Plaintiff's lawyer knows no shame. The court, being rational again, reduced the multiplier to a factor of 2 and awarded almost $900,000. Thus, the taxpayers of Sonoma county get to fund a $3.4 million dollar lottery payment to a guy who, unable to interview people, felt he was the perfect candidate for a job that involved, well, interviewing people. The entire matter thus proves the fourth and ultimate rule of employment litigation, first enunciated by a distinguished but anonymous jurist -- This ain't about justice, it's only about the money. Alberigi v. Sonoma County, Cal. Super. Ct., No. SCV-233788, 6/20/06.
Special thanks to our cynical but accurate partner Bob Zielinski for providing this entry.