In Mallory v. Brigham Young University, the Utah Supreme Court held that a police cadet employed by BYU was considered an employee for governmental immunity purposes. The decision reversed a 2012 Utah Court of Appeals decision holding otherwise, and concluded that the plaintiff had no claim because he had failed to serve a notice of claim […]
In a case decided on June 20, 2014, Dorsey v. DWS, 2014 UT 22, the Utah Supreme Court held that the Department of Workforce Services (DWS) had “erroneously interpreted” a statutory provision to ban seasonal employees who receive work-search deferrals from leaving the country. As in many cases as discussed in an earlier post, the unemployment […]
In Almond v. Unified School District #501, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which was enacted in 2009, does not extend the statute of limitations on all discrimination claims every time a person receives a paycheck. Rather, the Tenth Circuit concluded it applies to extend the statute […]
In Kocherhans v. Orem City, the Utah Court of Appeals upheld the decision of a trial court dismissing the claim of a former Orem City Treasury Division Manager for wrongful termination. The court ruled that the former employee’s failure to appeal the Employee Appeal Board’s decision to the Utah Court of Appeals precluded him from […]
In Swenson v. Department of Workforce Services, the Utah Court of Appeals “[took] issue with the [Workforce Appeals] Board’s reliance on evidence that was not presented to the ALJ or given to the parties” to reverse an ALJ’s decision in an appeal of an unemployment benefits determination. Although the Court ultimately affirmed the Workforce Appeals […]
The Utah Department of Workforce Services has apparently begun a campaign of alleging that unemployment applicants are committing fraud when applying for benefits while out of the United States. Relying on Utah Administrative Code Rule R994-403-112c(2)(i), the Department of Workforce Services has claimed that any travel outside of the United States makes a person ineligible […]
The Tenth Circuit ruled that an arbitrator drew from the essence of the labor contract when he reinstated an employee and imposed a last chance agreement on the employee despite the employee having violated a company rule and then lying about it. In Chevron Mining Inc. v. United Mine Workers of America Local 1307, the […]
In Sandoval v. Martinez-Barnish, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a district court’s decision to refuse to substitute the United States as the defendant in a case brought by a contract worker against the federal employee assigned to supervise her work. The contract worker brought a claim for assault, battery, and outrageous conduct against […]
On August 11, 2011, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a district court had properly dismissed an Age Discrimination in Employment Act and ERISA claim against an employer. In Tomlinson v. El Paso Corporation, the court stated that it would determine whether an ERISA plan was discriminatory on the basis of age by […]
