Skip to main content

Employer's Mistaken Belief About An Employee's Conduct DOES Support Valid Retaliation Claim


Heffernan v. City of Paterson, New Jersey - United States Supreme Court


Facts:  Jeffrey Heffernan ("Heffernan") worked as a police officer in Paterson, New Jersey.  Heffernan worked in the office of the Chief of Police who supported the incumbent mayor who was up for re-election.  Heffernan's mother supported the mayor's challenger and asked her son to pick up a sign supporting the challenger.  When Heffernan went to get the sign and talked to campaign staff of the mayor's challenger, other members of the police force saw him doing so and reported Heffernan to the Chief of Police.  The next day, Heffernan's supervisors demoted him from detective to patrol officer and assigned him to a "walking post".  This was apparently done to punish Heffernan for what his supervisors thought was "overt involvement" in the challenger's campaign for mayor.  (However, Heffernan was simply picking up the sign for his mother and was not involved in the challenger's campaign).  

Heffernan subsequently brought suit and claimed that the Chief of Police and others had demoted him because he had engaged in conduct that (on their mistaken view of the facts) constituted protected speech.  The District Court held that since Heffernan had not actually engaged in any First Amendment conduct, the respondents had not deprived him of any constitutionally protected speech (and therefore not retaliated against Heffernan).  The Third Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the District Court's ruling on the grounds that a free speech retaliation claim is actionable only where the adverse action was prompted by an employee's actual (rather than perceived) exercise of constitutional rights. 

Holding:  The United States Supreme Court began its analysis with a nod to the fact that an employer cannot discharge or demote an employee because that employee supports a particular political candidate.  For the sake of this case, the Court assumed the activities in which the Chief of Police though Heffernan engaged in are of a kind that cannot be constitutionally prohibited or punished by an employer.  As well, it was assumed that Heffernan's employer demoted him out of an improper motive.

In this instance, the Court relied upon the notion that Heffernan's employer's reason for demoting him is what counts.  The facts had apparently established that Heffernan was demoted out of a desire to prevent him from engaging in political activity protected by the First Amendment.  Even though Heffernan's employer made a factual mistake about Heffernan's behavior (he was not involved in the challenger's campaign...but was instead just picking up a sign for his mother), that did not mean the employer could escape liability for its retaliation. 

Judgment:  The United States Supreme Court reversed and remanded the opinion of the lower courts and held that even when an employer's actions are based upon a factual mistake about an employee's behavior (as in this case), that employee is entitled to challenge the unlawful action and subsequent retaliation based upon an employee who is perceived to have engaged in protected First Amendment conduct.

The Takeaway:  Will you look at that?  We have a decision from the Supreme Court that did not end in a 4 - 4 split!  (This case actually had six justices who sided with the employee here).  

This was a very interesting case to read through in so much that it focused on the conduct of an employer who acted out of mistaken belief of the facts.  While the employer had a strong argument to make that it had not violated Heffernan's First Amendment rights because it acted out of a mistaken belief of what actually happened, I think the Court got it right in this case.  As the Court noted, the issue turned on the employer's reason for demoting Heffernan (mistaken belief of the facts or not).  Based upon this reasoning, Heffernan's employer had violated his First Amendment rights by retaliating against him for apparently working with the challenger's campaign for mayor.  Had this been the actual situation, this would have been a First Amendment violation.  The fact that the employer was mistaken was soundly held to not impact the finding that the retaliation of Heffernan chilled his First Amendment right to free speech.

Majority Opinion Judge:  Judge Breyer

Date:  April 26, 2016

Opinion:  hr.cch.com/ELD/HeffernanPaterson042616.pdf

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

NLRB: Discussion Among Employees About Tip Pooling is Protected Concerted Activity

  This Advice Memorandum from the National Labor Relations Board’s Associate General Counsel, Jayme Sophir, addressed whether employees which discussed and complained about tip pooling at work constituted protected concerted activity. In relevant part, an employer in New York operated a chain of steakhouses.  While tip pooling was in place at these steakhouses, some of the employees objected to it on the grounds that it was not transparent and improperly divided tips among the workers.  Employees were told not to complain or talk to each other about the tip pool and were told that doing so would endanger their jobs.  Despite the employer later attempting to provide some clarity as to how the tips were being divided, rancor still existed among some employees.  At one point, the employees were told by a general manager that some employees that had been talking about the tip pool were “cleared out” and the employer would continue to do so. In the Advice Memorandum, it was noted that emplo
Post a Comment
Read more

Happening Tomorrow: Connecticut’s Minimum Wage Increases

For those employers and employees alike in Connecticut, mark your calendars as tomorrow, the minimum wage rate increases in the state from $13/hour to $14/hour. This wage hike comes after Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont had signed Public Act 19-4 into law in 2019 which progressively raised the state’s hourly minimum wage rate every year for five years.  In fact, next year, the hourly wage rate will top out at $15/hour.  Beginning in January of 2024, the hourly wage rate will be indexed to the employment cost index. For additional information:   https://portal.ct.gov/Office-of-the-Governor/News/Press-Releases/2022/06-2022/Governor-Lamont-Reminds-Residents-That-Minimum-Wage-Is-Scheduled-To-Increase-on-Friday
Post a Comment
Read more

What I’ve Been Reading This Week

A few years ago, I remember when the “Fight for $15” movement was taking off around the country.  Lo and behold, it appears that a $15/hour minimum wage is not the stopping point, which should be no surprise.  As the below article notes, New York is aggressively moving to ramp up hourly wage rates even higher.  While all the  below articles are worth a read, I called particular attention to that one. As always, below are a couple article that caught my eye this week. Disney World Workers Reject Latest Contract Offer Late last week, it was announced that workers at Disney World had rejected the most recent contract offer from the company, calling on their employer to do better.  As Brooks Barnes at The New York Times writes, the unions that represent about 32,000 workers at Disney World reported their members resoundingly rejected the 5 year contract offer which would have seen workers receive a 10% raise and retroactive increased back pay.  While Disney’s offer would have increased pa
Post a Comment
Read more