Show posts for: The Inbox

  • Since you’re already giving up all productivity during the big dance, why not check out the latest in Suits by Suits?

    • Bloomberg says that Hercules Offshore has defeated a “say on pay” lawsuit brought by a shareholder who claimed that the Hercules board should not have ignored an investor vote that the company’s executive compensation was too high.  Was defeating this lawsuit one of the fabled “Twelve Labours”?
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  • The Inbox - March 15, 2013

    | Zuckerman Spaeder Team

    Send up the white smoke!  After a week spent locked inside our offices -- or, for some of us, inside courtrooms -- your (usually) infallible Suits by Suits lawyers have finally voted on this week's Inbox:

    • Wednesday, three top multinational banks -- Citigroup, Capital One, and Wells Fargo -- all agreed to broaden their clawback policies after requests by the New York City Comptroller's Office.  Clawback policies enable an employer to recover compensation, stock options, bonuses, and other monies from former high-ranking executives who are later determined to have engaged in financial misconduct.  We are going to review the specific policies when released and will keep you updated.  The City Comptroller's press release can be read here.
    • We've said it before and we'll say it again:  your corporate emails are not private!  In one of a series of rulings in U.S. v. Finazzo, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York ruled that an executive "has no reasonable expectation of privacy or confidentiality in any communications" made through a work email account where the employer disclosed that it reserved the right to monitor an employee's usage of the system.
    • On Wednesday, Steve Jacobs, the former CEO of the Las Vegas Sands outpost in China, sued casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, alleging (among other things) that Adelson ordered him to threaten the head of Macau's government, Chief Executive Edmund Ho, for "not playing ball" in connection with condominiums that the Sands was trying to sell in Macau.  Jacobs was fired from Sands China in July of 2010 and subsequently filed a wrongful termination suit in October of that year.  On a totally unrelated note, Casino is one of our favorite movies.
    • Coincidentally, a former housekeeper sued Casino actress Sharon Stone -- co-star of the aforementioned film, as well as -- and do you really need to be told this? -- Total Recall, Basic Instinct, and many others, accusing Ms. Stone of retaliatory termination after the maid requested paid medical leave for injuries allegedly sustained while carrying Ms. Stone's groceries.  A spokesperson for Ms. Stone claims that the charges are "utterly baseless."
    • This one isn't a movie starring Arnold Schwarzenegger -- but perhaps it should be.  A 62-year-old man wrestled a shark out to sea in order to save children on a beach in Australia.  That's the good part.  The bad part?  Someone videotaped the heroic shark-wrestling; it went viral (because of course it did), and was viewed by the hero's employer -- a children's charity, no less -- who had been told the man and his wife were on sick leave.  The shark-wrestler (and his wife, who had been employed by the same charity) were subsequently fired.  As Rick Perry might say:  "oops."  (Side note for the eventual movie adaptation:  According to Wikipedia, the Governator is 65.)
    • Reporter Bryant Ruiz Switzky of the Washington Business Journal brought our attention to a very interesting report issued by Ernst & Young, and now we pass that along to you:  the Big Four firm warns corporate directors that they are "being watched" carefully by shareholders and should tweak executive compensation and other issues accordingly.  If you're involved in pay issues, you need to read this report.
    • On Monday, Dr. David Naarian of Philadelphia, PA sued his former partners in 3B Orthopaedics PC over the sale of their medical practice to Aria Health, claiming that he had been defrauded out of more than $800,000 in the $4 million sale.
    • Our friends at the Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation have published yet another relevant article, this one by Noam Noked, "Dealing with the SEC's Focus on Protecting Whistleblowers."
    • Relatedly:  just this week, a federal judge drastically reduced a jury's award to a whistleblower.  In 2009, Weihua Huang was terminated by the University of Virginia in retaliation for reporting U.Va's alleged mismanagement of grant money and a jury awarded him $160,000 in back pay and $500,000 in compensatory damages.  Earlier this week, the trial judge granted U.Va's motion to reduce the compensatory damages awarded by the jury by 80% -- from $500,000 to $100,000 -- on the grounds that the award was "not proportional" to the injury suffered.  As is typical in these cases, the court compared the award to other jury awards within the district.
    • Troubles continue for the venture capital industry; we've discussed the case of Ellen Pao in considerable depth (here and here, for starters), but this week, we learned that another venture capital firm, CMEA Capital, is facing allegations of sexual and racial misconduct in the workplace, including sexually explicit behavior towards three former female employees.
    • Career development coach Stacey Hawley, writing for Forbes, has penned an article entitled "Negotiating An Employment Agreement," that offers some practical tips to the executive on the move.
    • And finally:  who says CEOs aren't human?  When VeriFone ousted CEO Doug Bergeron on Monday, he penned a weepy goodbye letter, telling staff "I will always love you and I will always love VeriFone."  No word if he read the letter aloud while playing Celine Dion music softly in the background, but apparently he read our advice to departing CEOs (unlike outgoing Groupon CEO Andrew Mason).
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  • The Inbox, Snowquester Edition

    | Zuckerman Spaeder Team

    Here at the SuitsbySuits Tower in Washington, D.C., we’re closing the week of the Snowquester that Wasn’t, a snowstorm that could have given us a large thumping of snow but turned out to be…well, more disappointing than a playoff loss by you-know-who.  The chatter about the storm has, though, led to a rare mea culpa by a prominent weather blog and pretty much kicked off the Virginia governor’s race in a dispute over one candidate’s tweet about safety in the snow. 

    In any event, things other than a poem-inducing non-blizzard happened this week, and here are the highlights:

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  • The Inbox - March 1, 2013

    | Zuckerman Spaeder Team

    Capping off a big week in Suits by Suits, where even the Pope has to give two weeks’ notice before resigning:

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  • We’re not sequestering this week’s Suits by Suits news:

    • Novartis announced that it would rescind its agreement to pay its former chairman, Daniel Vasella, $78 million to keep him from working for competitors and sharing his experience with them.  According to the New York Times, the proposed payment sparked outrage in Novartis’s home country, Switzerland.  Vasella released a statement that was significantly more even-keeled than anything I would have written after losing $78 million.
    • In other departure news, American Airlines CEO Tom Horton will get a $20 million severance payment when his company’s merger with US Airways is finalized, reported the Dallas Morning News.  Plus he gets lifetime flight benefits, although the agreement doesn’t appear to prohibit the company from putting him in a middle seat in the back of the plane.
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  • The Inbox - February 15, 2013

    | Zuckerman Spaeder Team

    This week in suits by suits:

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  • The Inbox: Monopoly Iron Flatly Terminated Edition‎

    | Zuckerman Spaeder Team

    You may have heard this week that Hasbro, the maker of the Monopoly board game, has decided to let go of one of the board’s signature tokens – the iron.  The iron, according to NPR, seems to be a bit steamed behind a stoic exterior, while looking ahead to greener pastures.  Of course, we have no idea yet if the iron has a claim for wrongful termination – perhaps there’s a wrinkle in his contract with Hasbro? – but we’ll certainly keep an eye on it, at least to avoid burning ourselves.  It does seem, though, that whatever happens this guy always wins. 

    Turning to relevant matters involving people: 

    • We’ve written about the Family and Medical Leave Act, which turned 20 years old this week.  On its birthday, some argue it goes to far, while others say not far enough – analysis of the issue from both sides is here.  At the same time, the Department of Labor has published rules extending the reach of FMLA to veterans, military families, and certain airline employees.
    • A former employee of BAE Systems, who worked for the defense contractor in Afghanistan, has filed suit against the company under the False Claims Act, alleging he was let go after he blew the whistle on the company’s billing practices, which he asserts were fraudulent and excessive. 
    • This one sounds, well, Solomonic to us: The California Supreme Court, in a unanimous ruling, held that where a bus driver proved she was terminated for a prohibited discriminatory reason (pregnancy), but the employer showed it had legitimate reasons to fire her even without the discrimination, then the bus driver could get attorney’s fees and injunctive relief – but not back pay, other damages, or reinstatement.  The opinion in Harris v. Santa Monica is here.
    • Finally, from the “signing doesn’t imply reading” department: Don Marsh, the former CEO of Marsh Supermarkets, a Midwestern grocery chain, testified this week in the company’s case seeking to recover about $3 million he spent on personal expenses.  According to the report of his testimony here, Mr. Marsh said the company’s code of conduct – which might have prohibited the spending – didn’t apply to him because he “wasn’t aware of it,” even though he signed it. 
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  • The Inbox - February 1, 2013

    | Zuckerman Spaeder Team

    Before you root, root, root for the Ravens in Superbowl XLVII; before you go pick up with that 100-piece platter of buffalo wings; before you even crack open a single cold one, you owe it to yourself to read this week's super-sized Inbox:

    • A California appellate court reversed a trial court verdict for Julie Gilman Veronese, which had awarded her $1.3 million in damages against her former employer, Lucasfilm Ltd., which had terminated Ms. Veronese upon finding that she was pregnant out of claimed "concern for the health of the fetus."  Veronese has appealed to the California Supreme Court, which has 60 days to decide whether or not to take the case.  We'll be watching.
    • A Florida appellate court has sought the guidance of the Florida Supreme Court as to whether a judge must recuse himself from cases in which he is "Facebook friends" with the prosecutor.
    • In a story that's near and dear to us here at Suits by Suits, Martha Neil of the ABA Journal has written a short article collecting stories under the banner "When can workers be fired for Facebook posts and tweets?"   As you may know, we've had quite a lot to say on the subject; see our Facebook-related posts here, here, here, here, and here, just for starters.
    • A New York state court judge has dismissed a wrongful termination suit filed by an employee of an agency of the United Methodist Church under the so-called "ministerial exception," ruling that to adjudicate the dispute would require him as a judge to interpret the denomination's religious code of conduct and thus violate the First Amendment.  The employee, Douglas Mills, had argued that his role was "primarily secular" in terms of promoting interfaith dialogue with other churches; the Court held that "even if Mills performed primarily secular duties, the ministerial exception will apply if his job duties reflected a role in conveying the church's message and carrying out its mission."
    • It isn't all good news for churches, though; the St. Louis-based Truth in the World Deliverance Ministries Church found itself rather uncomfortably in the news this week after its pastor, Alois Bell, scratched out a tip at a local Applebee's, writing "I give God 10%, why do you get 18?" and replacing the six-dollar tip with $0.  How do we know that Pastor Bell did such a thing?  Because another waitress, outraged and insulted at the lack of a tip, snapped a photo of the receipt and posted it to the online site reddit.  The receipt went viral and Pastor Bell was shamed; unfortunately, the waitress who posted it was fired.
    • If a $6 tip strikes you as extravagant, how about a $13 million one?  After having negotiated a $3.3 billion deal to sell off several of grocery and retail giant Supervalu's brands, outgoing CEO Wayne Sales will receive a $12.8 million severance package (a "golden parachute") before being replaced by Sam Duncan at some point in the first quarter of 2013, according to Supervalu's SEC filings.  Sales earns his golden parachute after a mere six months on the job.
    • A federal judge in Washington, D.C. dismissed a wrongful termination lawsuit brought by former law professor Stephanie Brown against U.D.C.'s David A. Clarke School of Law, arguing that she had been improperly denied tenure in violation of the school's faculty handbook, as well as fired on the basis of race and gender.  The court determined that the handbook was not a binding contract and that Prof. Brown had presented insufficient evidence of race and gender discrimination.
    • Finally, Robert Grattan of the Austin Business Journal penned two articles on covenants not to compete:  "Keys to a good noncompete contract," and "Who reads those noncompete contracts?  Not enough."
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  • The Inbox - January 18, 2013

    | Zuckerman Spaeder Team

    This week in suits by suits, with a tip of the hat to some of our fellow bloggers:

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  • The Inbox

    | Zuckerman Spaeder Team

    Here in Washington, we’re getting ready for the Presidential Inauguration next weekend.  But the news doesn’t stop: 

    • One Question Too Far:  An assistant VP at a bank in Texas alleges he was fired because he is gay.  Marty Edwards says in his lawsuit that he was passed over for promotion for several years, and when he questioned this he was told he didn’t fit the bank’s “image;” when he then asked specifically if his sexual orientation was a factor, he asserts, the bank asked for his resignation. 
    • Another Showcase Showdown: the saga surrounding pregnancy and models who work on TV game show The Price Is Right continues.  We’ve covered the allegations that the show’s producers illegally terminated the models here.  Now, fired model Shane Stirling is appealing a trial court’s dismissal of her suit, contending the judge got it wrong by holding she needed to be pregnant at the time she was fired in order to bring a case alleging pregnancy discrimination.  Stirling was fired soon after she returned to work from maternity leave; the producers say she was let go as part of a general reduction of the number of models on the show. 
    • From the “Is He Fired or Not” department: The former CEO of ShopSavvy has filed an interesting complaint in Texas state court, alleging that: 1) the company’s board improperly terminated him without cause; then 2) started negotiating with him to work in a different job; then 3) denied it had ever fired him; and finally 4) sent him a letter telling him he was fired.  This will be a neat one to watch, but it points out that it’s generally a good idea to be clear when communicating employment decisions and negotiating with executives.
    • What Brown Can’t Do For You:  UPS did not need to provide a pregnant employee with reasonable accommodations to enable her to keep her job, the federal 4th Circuit Court of Appeals has held, writing: “One may characterize the UPS policy as insufficiently charitable, but a lack of charity does not amount to discriminatory animus directed at a protected class of employees.”
    • Trying Again: Colleague Andrew Torrez wrote here about former Bloomberg executive Anthony Martinez’ suit against his employer, in which he alleged his termination violated the Americans with Disabilities Act.  The trial court held that Martinez’s claim was covered by the forum selection clause in his employment contract with Bloomberg, which required all disputes to be litigated in England – and Martinez’s claim couldn’t be brought there.  Now, Martinez has filed an appeal from that decision with the federal 2d Circuit.  We’ll keep our eyes on this one, because it raises interesting issues about the scope of these often-overlooked – but frequently important – clauses that mandate where an executive and an employer have to litigate any disputes between them. 
    • How About A Knuckle Sandwich: While it’s not the typical employment dispute we focus on, we couldn’t let the week close without mentioning this dispute between a Subway employee and a customer, who almost came to blows when the customer asked for ketchup on his cheesesteak sandwich.  Fascinating fact learned in our research – and we promise we never thought about this issue before -- but it appears Subway stores usually don’t even carry ketchup.  In any event, the employee has been fired by Subway. 
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As the regulatory and business environments in which our clients operate grow increasingly complex, we identify and offer perspectives on significant legal developments affecting businesses, organizations, and individuals. Each post aims to address timely issues and trends by evaluating impactful decisions, sharing observations of key enforcement changes, or distilling best practices drawn from experience. InsightZS also features personal interest pieces about the impact of our legal work in our communities and about associate life at Zuckerman Spaeder.

Information provided on InsightZS should not be considered legal advice and expressed views are those of the authors alone. Readers should seek specific legal guidance before acting in any particular circumstance.

Contributing Editors
John J. Connolly

John J. Connolly
Partner
Email | +1 410.949.1149


Man

Andrew N. Goldfarb
Partner
Email | +1 202.778.1822


Sara Alpert Lawson_listing

Sara Alpert Lawson
Partner
Email | +1 410.949.1181


Nicholas DiCarlo

Nicholas M. DiCarlo
Associate
Email | +1 202.778.1835


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