Our Top Ten Favorite Employment Cases of All Time: #1
As part of our ongoing commitment to providing the finest in employment law education, we’re counting down our Top Ten Favorite Employment Law Cases of All Time.
Drum roll, please.
After much reflection, consideration and intense lobbying by various interest groups, we are pleased to announce our winner . . .
The Case of the Lying Lovesick Lawyer
It was truly tough to narrow all the choices down to a single #1 favorite. But because this case featured a bad lawyer who lied and got caught by a crack team of HR professionals who did all the right things from an employment law perspective, it was tough to beat.
Here’s what happened . . .
A female employee of Saint-Gobain Corp. started receiving “sexually tinged” anonymous love poems at work. She suspected a company lawyer named David Bennett. Why? Some of the spellings in the poem were “British” and Bennett hails from the U.K.
Bennett vehemently denied writing the poems. In fact, he took it a step further and denied that he had ever written a poem.
The company’s HR department conducted a prompt and thorough investigation. First, a handwriting expert concluded that it was “highly probable” that Bennett was indeed the author of the notes. Second, a search of Bennett’s office turned up other poems written by Bennett, refuting his claim that he had never written a single poem.
But the true ”Columbo” moment came when HR interviewed Bennett and asked him to spell the word “meager.” When he spelled it ”meagre” — just as it had been written in the poems – they knew that they had their man.
Bennett continued his denials and even filed a lawsuit claiming age discrimination. But, thanks to the top-notch HR investigatory work, the judge threw out his claims and ruled in favor of the company.
The Lesson? This case is a perfect example of one of our Top Ten Employment Law Tips: Get All the Facts, Man. The company’s prompt and thorough investigation enabled it to make a fact-based decision and to establish that it acted for a legitimate, non-discriminatory reason.
Click here for a handy investigation checklist that would make Columbo proud.