Oakland Personal Injury Attorney Blog

Employer’s Neutral Application of Its Policies Dooms California Sales Representative’s FEHA Case

March 29, 2017 | by Stephen M. Fuerch

In a disability discrimination case, there are several things that can possibly help the employee win her claim. These may include an employer’s non-neutral manner of applying company policies or a failure to engage properly in the interactive process. For one pharmaceutical company sales representative, her employer did none of these improper things, leading the federal courts to conclude that the employer had not violated the Fair Employment and Housing Act.

California Vehicle Accident Victim’s Unique Medical Makeup Triggers $2.8M Jury Verdict Award

March 15, 2017 | by Stephen M. Fuerch

In any vehicle accident case, the facts of the case will be unique in various ways. If you, as a plaintiff, have medical conditions that make you uniquely susceptible to injury, and you suffered greater injuries due to your condition, the law says that you should not be penalized for your condition. The case of a woman injured in a Northern California car crash highlighted this “eggshell plaintiff” rule, with a jury awarding her almost $3 million in damages due to the knee, back, and mental injuries she suffered.

Appeals Court Upholds FEHA Liability Judgment in Favor of LAPD Academy Recruits

February 28, 2017 | by Stephen M. Fuerch

The Fair Employment and Housing Act requires employers to take certain steps to reasonably accommodate employees with disabilities. In some cases, one such possible accommodation is job reassignment. The law does not require employers to offer reassignment as an accommodation to job applicants. So how does the law classify certain employees at the very beginning of their employment, such as police academy recruits? According to a recent California Court of Appeal decision, probationary and trainee employees are akin to at-will employees who, unlike job applicants, are entitled to reassignment when it is a reasonable accommodation for their disabilities.

California Appeals Court Revives Injured Driver’s Case Against Tow Truck Company

February 15, 2017 | by Stephen M. Fuerch

A man who was seriously injured by a car that had hydroplaned received a favorable ruling recently from the California Court of Appeal that allowed him to resume pursuing his case against a tow truck company that moved his vehicle. The man’s case raised a possible dispute of fact regarding whether the tow truck driver violated a duty to the man by failing to remove him and his vehicle from a busy freeway during a rainstorm.

California Counselor Allowed to Pursue Sexual Orientation Discrimination Case Even Though She Was Heterosexual

January 26, 2017 | by Stephen M. Fuerch

California law has significant legal protections to safeguard employees from workplace discrimination. You may wonder, however, what happens if you believe that you’re being targeted because of discrimination, even though you’re not a member of a historically disadvantaged group. For example, what if you believe your employer is discriminating against you because you’re heterosexual? In the case of one Southern California drug counselor, the Second District Court of Appeal concluded that the arguments she made were enough to support an actionable claim that her employer treated heterosexual women more poorly than similarly situated heterosexual men and homosexual employees.

California Appeals Court Revives Producer’s Wrongful Termination Case Against CNN

January 12, 2017 | by Stephen M. Fuerch

As an employee, pursuing your wrongful termination case may mean clearing many hurdles. In one recent case that the Second District Court of Appeal decided in favor of the employee, the employee faced an extra leap: overcoming his employer’s anti-SLAPP defense. The appeals court concluded that the employer’s acts of discrimination and retaliation could not qualify as acts in furtherance of its free speech rights, thereby granting an important victory to employees of media employers.

California Supreme Court Refuses to Hear FEHA Case of Association Discrimination: What it Means for Employees and Employers

December 28, 2016 | by Stephen M. Fuerch

Sometimes, a court’s decision not to act can be enormously important in affecting the law. This was the case recently when the California Supreme Court refused to accept an employer’s appeal in a truck driver’s Fair Employment and Housing Act case. The high court’s refusal to issue an opinion in the case leaves intact a Court of Appeal ruling that offers hope to employees that the FEHA’s anti-discrimination provisions may extend not only to persons with disabilities but also to persons without disabilities who are victims of workplace discrimination due to being closely associated with a person with disabilities.

Workplace Absences and How They Can Influence Your California Disability Discrimination Case

December 15, 2016 | by Stephen M. Fuerch

A recent case involving a radio DJ and her former employer is very useful in some of the lessons it imparts. Not the least of these are that you should not give up on your case at the first sign of a setback, and there can be more than one way to prove necessary elements of Fair Employment and Housing Act disability discrimination cases. In the case, the California Court of Appeal threw out a summary judgment in favor of the employer because, even if the employee’s disability did not affect her on-air performance, it could still qualify as impairing the major life activity of working if it forced her to miss work frequently.

California Employee’s Criticism of Employer’s Policies’ Impact on Disabled Community Wasn’t Protected by FEHA

November 30, 2016 | by Stephen M. Fuerch

California’s prohibitions against employment discrimination, including those contained in the Fair Employment and Housing Act, provide significant protection to employees, guarding them against mistreatment in the form of improper discrimination. In addition to protecting certain groups like women, people of color, and religious minorities, the FEHA also protects some employees who engage in certain protected activities from retaliation by their employers. Unfortunately for one San Francisco parks and recreation worker, the California Court of Appeal determined that the law did not protect him, since the activities that he claimed got him fired were not protected activities under the law.

When Your Employer Can (and Can’t) Force You to Arbitrate Your California Wrongful Termination Case

November 15, 2016 | by Stephen M. Fuerch

When you are pursuing your employer for employment discrimination, there are paths you can choose and sometimes some hurdles to clear in choosing a course that will give you a good chance of obtaining the successful outcome you need and deserve. Sometimes, one of these hurdles is avoiding having your case sidetracked into binding arbitration. In a recent case from Southern California, the California Court of Appeal concluded that an employer couldn’t use a signed employee handbook to force the employee into arbitration because the employer had written into the handbook express language stating that it did not create a binding contract.