A FEDERAL jury in Los Angeles recently awarded a former supervisor of the United Parcel Service, Inc. (UPS) more than $18 million in damages after he was fired for filing a claim for unpaid wages against UPS.
It all began when Marlo filed a class action wage-and-hour lawsuit in 2003. However, after years of litigation, the case was not granted certification, i.e., it could not be tried as a class, and was decertified in May 2008. Marlo then proceeded as an individual plaintiff.
In mid-2008, after decertification, Marlo encouraged other UPS supervisors to file their own lawsuits against UPS in an attempt to change allegedly unsafe working conditions at the company. Fifty-four UPS supervisors filed individual lawsuits against UPS between August and October 2008. Marlo also made complaints about workplace safety concerns and safety violations to UPS and to several government agencies.
Some of these complaints included inadequate heaters for employees working in sub-freezing temperatures, employees working well over 40 hours per week, and employees driving UPS trucks after working more than 60 hours per week, violating government regulations.
Marlo claimed that he was denied promotion for a number of years, and was terminated in November 2008, a few months before his wage-and-hour case was scheduled for trial. He claimed that defendant UPS retaliated against him for his actions and that he was wrongfully terminated.
UPS, on the other hand, said Marlo was not promoted due to conflicts with peers, and when he was approached in 2008 about being promoted, he rejected the idea. UPS also claimed that Marlo verbally assaulted and threatened a customer in October 2008, and that he intimidated an employee who witnessed and reported the incident.
Marlo said that UPS falsely asserted that he threatened a customer as a pretext for the termination, that UPS conducted a sham investigation, and withheld key eyewitness information from the investigators that would have disproved the allegations against him.
Marlo, through his lawyers, was willing to settle the case for $650,000 but UPS opted to go to trial and was instead slapped with more than $18 million in judgment. The eight-person jury unanimously awarded Marlo $2,201,425 in economic and non-economic damages, and an additional $15,897,053 in punitive damages following a six-day trial.
The law prohibits retaliation by an employer against an employee who has asserted (or assisted another in asserting) rights protected under the laws. Such retaliation is prohibited even if the employee’s underlying discrimination or harassment claim was not successful. In order to succeed in a claim for retaliation, the employee must prove all of the following:
1) The employee engaged in a protected activity, such as claiming wages due, reporting discrimination, testifying as a witness, or some other action to help enforce the law. Filing a grievance, contacting the media, refusing to perform illegal assignments, and other forms of standing up against violations of the law are also protected.
2) The employer knew or believed that the employee engaged in such protected activity.
3) The employee suffered an adverse employment action, such as a discharge, demotion, formal discipline, and denial of overtime, promotion, or benefits.
4) The employee’s protected activity caused the employer to take adverse action.
Employees who prove they were wrongfully terminated may recover loss of earnings, emotional distress, punitive damages, and in certain cases, attorneys’ fees and costs. The jury’s verdict against UPS is a message to employers that retaliating against employees for exercising legally protected rights can, indeed, be expensive.
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C. Joe Sayas, Jr., Esq. is an experienced trial attorney who has successfully obtained significant results, including several million dollar recoveries for consumers against insurance companies and big business. He is a member of the Million Dollar-Advocates Forum—a prestigious group of trial lawyers whose membership is limited to those who have demonstrated exceptional skill, experience and excellence in advocacy. He has been featured in the cover of Los Angeles Daily Journal’s Verdicts and Settlements for his professional accomplishments and recipient of numerous awards from community and media organizations. His litigation practice concentrates in the following areas: serious personal injuries, wrongful death, insurance claims, unfair business practices, wage and hour (overtime) litigation. You can visit his website at www.joesayas law.com or contact his office by telephone at (818) 291-0088.
