On June 12, 2013, the SEC issued the second-ever whistleblower bounty award pursuant to Section 922 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Dodd-Frank) in connection with SEC v. Andrey C. Hicks and...more
In a recent lawsuit before the Superior Court of New Jersey in Hudson County, a jury unanimously awarded $2.1 million in punitive damages to a hospital lab technician after finding his employer retaliated against him for...more
On May 15, 2013, OSHA determined that Enercon Services Inc. (Company), an engineering firm that provides nuclear power facilities with engineering support services, violated the whistleblower provisions of the Energy...more
On April 24, 2013, the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California issued its final ruling that a SOX whistleblower complaint survived a Rule 12(b)(6) challenge. Zulfer v. Playboy Enterprises, Inc., No....more
On March 22, 2013, the New York State Senate introduced the S4362 Proposal which, through a “bounty,” gives financial awards to whistleblowers who provide original information to the Department of Financial Services (DFS)...more
In what might be an unsettling trend for employers, juries in Philadelphia and Anchorage have recently issued multi-million dollar jury awards in favor of whistleblowers. Specifically, on March 22, 2013, a Philadelphia Common...more
The U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado followed a trend of decisions concluding that a plaintiff need not have provided the SEC with information regarding alleged federal securities law violations to pursue a...more
Tyco Electronics Corporation filed a Petition for Rehearing En Banc with the Third Circuit on April 2, 2013 asking the court to reconsider its March 19 decision in Wiest v. Lynch, No. 11-cv-4257, 2013 U.S. App. LEXIS 5345 (3d...more
In Wiest v. Lynch, No. 11-cv-4257, 2013 U.S. App. LEXIS 5345 (3d Cir. March 19, 2013), the Third Circuit gave Chevron deference to U.S. Department of Labor Administrative Review Board’s (ARB) interpretation of “protected...more
On February 28, 2013, OSHA ordered Union Pacific Railroad (UP) to reinstate the employment of and pay over $309,000 ($150,000 in punitive damages, $87,600 in compensatory damages, $71,700 in back pay with interest, plus...more
On February 22, 2013, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) released an interim final rule concerning the whistleblower protection provisions of The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act...more
During discovery in an SEC administrative and cease-and-desist proceeding instituted in December 2012 (pursuant to Sections 9(b) and 9(f) of the Investment Company Act of 1940)[1] the SEC Division of Enforcement (DOE)...more
OSHA recently announced that it ordered Norfolk Southern Railway (Company) to pay three former workers a combined $1,121,099 for violating the whistleblower provisions of the Federal Railroad Safety Act (FRSA), which protects...more
In a brief but notable decision, the Ninth Circuit affirmed summary judgment in an employer’s favor on causation grounds in a SOX whistleblower retaliation case. Kim v. The Boeing Co., 487 Fed. Appx. 356 (9th Cir. 2012)....more
An Illinois Appellate Court recently found that the Illinois Whistleblower Protection Act (740 ILCS § 174/1, et seq.) (IWA) does not require that the employee’s disclosure is the first, or only, disclosure of a violation of a...more
On January 28, 2013, in a letter to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and the U.S. Department of Treasury (Treasury), Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA), co-author of the 2006 updates to Section 7623 of the Internal Revenue...more
On February 13, 2013, the IRS issued its “Fiscal Year 2012 Report to the Congress on the Use of Section 7623,” as required by The Tax Relief and Health Care Act of 2006 (Act). The Act was established “to encourage people with...more
The U.S. District Court for the Central District of California ruled that a SOX whistleblower complaint survived a Rule 12(b)(6) challenge on “reasonable belief” grounds and found that complaints of potential future...more
2/18/2013
/ Board of Directors ,
Corporate Bonuses ,
Federal Rule 12(b)(6) ,
Fraud ,
Internal Controls ,
Playboy ,
Retaliation ,
Sarbanes-Oxley ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Split of Authority ,
Termination ,
Whistleblowers
Employers who believe they have been subjected to frivolous whistleblower suits are starting to say “enough is enough,” and searching for ways to vindicate their rights and send a strong message....more
On January 18, 2013, the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) Office of Inspector General (OIG) released its report titled Evaluation of the SEC’s Whistleblower Program. The report presented a largely positive review of...more
The stakes increase and the landscape changes tremendously in a whistleblower case when the Secretary of Labor (Secretary) issues a preliminary reinstatement order....more
“But-for” or “mixed motive” is a causation question not unknown to the U.S. Supreme Court. In Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins, 490 U.S. 228 (1989), a plurality held that the anti-discrimination provision of Title VII only...more
On January 18, 2013, a former New Mexico Public Regulation Commission (PRC) employee prevailed in the first case to reach trial under the state’s Whistleblower Protection Act (NMWPA)....more
OSHA recently released statistics (aggregated by BNA) showing dramatic increases in both the number of whistleblower cases filed with OSHA last year as well as the number of OSHA determinations....more
Awaiting President Obama’s signature, Sections 827 and 828 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013 (NDAA) would enhance the whistleblower protections of contractor and subcontractor employees for the...more