Thanks for your participation — enjoy the month!

To help enhance your viewing experience, each week I provide a critique of the action from an employment lawyer’s perspective. We also conduct a weekly “Are You Smarter Than a Lawyer?” Contest. Anyone who leaves a comment below identifying a legal issue that I missed will win a valuable prize.

Last Night’s Episode: Spooked

The Plot: Here’s NBC’s official description: “Erin has a hard time trying to make the office Halloween party exactly how Andy and Robert California want.”

My Analysis:

1. Issue: How NOT to Police Halloween Costumes
   Description: Andy’s highly subjective and inconsistently applied costume approval process created at least a dozen potential lawsuits in the first minute-and-a-half of the episode. His first two “rules” (“Don’t be offensive” and “Don’t be cliché”) were quickly eclipsed by his third (“Don’t take the first two too seriously”). Andy rejected several perfectly appropriate costumes and approved several perfectly inappropriate costumes on purely arbitrary grounds, making several potentially discriminatory comments along the way. Dwight’s dreadlocks-and-coconut-bra costume was a walking sex/race/religious harassment suit waiting to happen. Meredith — dressed as Kate Middleton — made highly inappropriate comments about the royals. Oscar’s “costume” resulted in inappropriate comments by him and others.
   Risk: $$$
2. Issue: Misrepresentation
   Description: Andy lied to Meredith about the bunny costume already being “taken.” Meredith (sort of) lied to Andy about her whereabouts during the royal wedding. Toby told the CEO that he (Toby) is “so great,” which is clearly not the case.
   Risk: $$
3. Issue: Defamation
   Description: Meredith made several highly disparaging (and downright creepy) comments about various current and former members of the royal family.
   Risk: $$
4. Issue: Dating the Boss
   Description: Now that Andy is the boss, his are-they-dating-or-are-they-not relationship with Erin opens the company to even more potential liability than before. This quote from Erin sums up the dangers quite nicely: “When they talk about all the nice things about dating a co-worker, they don’t mention one of the best parts. After you’re done dating, you still get to work together. Every. Single. Day.” Yikes.
   Risk: $$$$
5. Issue: Emotional Distress
   Description: Jim’s initial refusal of Kevin’s request to join him and Darryl in donning Miami Heat uniforms as costumes made Kevin cry. Pam’s “rating” of Erin as 2 out of 3 as a receptionist almost made Erin cry. Angela’s and Phyllis’ de-decoration efforts almost made Erin cry. Andy’s request that Erin re-decorate to PG-13 standards almost made Erin cry. Andy’s request that Erin meet with him at the end of the day almost made Erin cry. Kevin’s disclosure of the ending of Rise of the Planet of the Apes almost made Andy cry. The CEO spent most of the episode discovering each employee’s fears and then told a highly inappropriate story that played on each those fears, visibly (and deeply) disturbing every single employee. Angela’s continuing efforts to mock Pam’s pregnancy-related weight gain clearly caused Pam pain.
   Risk: $$$$$
6. Issue: Dwight’s 1,000th Workplace Violence Incident
   Description: Dwight was shown committing a variety of acts of mayhem in various ultra-violent Halloween costumes. HR “Professional” Toby’s wholly ineffectual attempts to stop Dwight are best summed up in this quote: “Every Halloween I tell him the same thing: You can’t bring weapons into the office. And every year he says the same thing: As soon as I get my weapons back I’m gonna kill you.” If Dwight ever actually harms anyone, the company will have to pay lots and lots and lots (and lots) of money.
   Risk: $$$$$$$$$$
7. Issue: Dangerous (And Inappropriate) Decorations
   Description: Several of the Halloween decorations exposed workers to potentially hazardous conditions and/or were of a graphic violent/sexual nature (especially after Erin “upped” the overall theme to PG13). Erin also tried to convince her co-workers to play a highly inappropriate game of poker. The fact that Erin’s re-decorating was arguably in response to pressure from the CEO could expose the company to additional potential liability.
   Risk: $$$$
8. Issue: Child in the Workplace
   Description: The CEO brought his child (dressed in an ultra-violent costume replete with blood, etc.) into the workplace and allowed him to make lots of inappropriate comments and generally distract the employees. Dwight and other employees made a number of highly inappropriate comments to the child, quite possibly scarring him for life. Dwight and the child mutually each arguably bullied the other. While that’s not an accepted cause of action in many states, some courts are starting to consider such claims.
   Risk: $$
9. Issue: “Cinema of the Unsettling”
   Description: Gabe showed a highly inappropriate video (featuring several employees) that made his co-workers freak out and/or nearly vomit.
   Risk: $$$
10. Issue: Other Obscene Gestures and Comments
    Description: Pam and Oscar made highly inappropriate gestures. Virtually every employee made an inappropriate comment.
    Risk: $$
11. Issue: Theft of Company Time
12. Description: The employees were even more creative than usual in finding ways not to work. The all-day party sanctioned by the CEO and Andy (including the rather massive decoration and re-decoration effort and other preparations) distracted everyone. Pam told a ghost story. The CEO (as noted above) told a strange story about a swearing baby. Multiple skeleton-clad employees spent time choreographing and dancing. Dwight and the CEO’s son spent lots of time playing violent M-rated video games. The CEO’s son used Jim’s computer for several hours, preventing Jim from working. Andy spent time texting his buddies.
    Risk: $$

Just in case you weren’t aware, we restarted it @ 11:30. Looks like about 1,200 of you were able to stick around and that 1,000+ of you dropped off.

The recorded version is available here. Again, our sincere apologies for any inconvenience!

See you next week!

Mark