EE retaliation for termination

mcmel

I'm in the process of appealing an ee's unemployment determination, (he doesn't deserve unemployment benefits), and now he has retaliated.

It seems that he has alerted the local police department that much of his former shift of co-workers goes and gets high during break; we've found out that the police have been here three nights in row, frisking the employees and searching their cars after break.

We haven't had a cause for concern (lately) regarding drug-use during break, so we don't have a concern about that at this time.

Our concern is the way the authorities are treating our employees AND the fact that our former ee has this much pull in this little crummy town.

The local sheriff's deputy is on his way, we'll be having a sit-down with him regarding search warrants and such.

Has anything similar happened to anybody else? We're confident that on our property (or anywhere) they need a warrant before harassing our employees, correct?

deniseE

I think if the EE's are outside in plain sight, and they act "suspicious" the cops are free to come and ask questions and search within reason; however, I believe that to burst into your property and search they do need a warrant.

marc

You may want to get counsel in on this one. Not just for the harassing of EEs in the lot, but for a police department to act as an agent for revenge of a former EE may be actionable. A call from your counsel to the DA could be in order. Then you may want to explore other cease and desist options with your counsel with respect to this former EE.

System

Marc is on target. Employees have a reasonable expectation of privacy. Allowing anyone, even the cops, to violate that right spells trouble with a capital "T"

ray a

The local sheriff is our next door neighbor and they have been to our facility several times to deliver warrants, or interview people, or even searching for people. They have always been cooperative never going beyond what we allow.

Don D

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 01-15-04 AT 06:11PM (CST)[/font][br][br]The authorities cannot search a vehicle on demand unless they are game wardens (at least in this state). They either have to have the driver's permission to sniff or search or a search warrant which is unlikely. Sounds like Mississippi in 1950. What state are you in, Arkansas? At the risk of being edited, acting suspiciously returning from break or coming out of the place of work is horse crap. Any hungry attorney will jump on this issue.