Whistleblower Receives Over 1 Million After Retaliation

There are many charitable organizations in California who provide very important services for people with few resources. These organizations provide food, shelter, medical help and many other services as well. While these organizations are generally not in the business of simply making money like many for profit companies, there are still many rules that they must follow. The most important is that they need to ensure that the people they serve are not harmed and that the people running it do not take advantage of them.

Unfortunately, this is what was happening in a boys’ home in California. Multiple boys at the home were making complaints about being abused. A clinical director at the boys’ home became concerned about these complaints and raised his concerns with the CEO. On multiple occasions he was told be quiet, he was suspended at one point in time and finally fired for making these complaints to the CEO. He sued the boys home after his termination for whistleblower retaliation and a jury recently awarded him $1.1 million for back pay and future pay as well as his pain and suffering.

While people would hope that this is an isolated incident, it occurs more often than one would think. There are many violations of the law and other issues that the employees of these companies are aware of and raise concerns about them. Some employees may also go above management and report violations to law enforcement. While these complaints certainly hurt the company, they cannot take retaliatory actions against employees who make the complaints. If they do, like in the case above, the employees may be entitled to compensation.

There are many good charitable organizations in California, but there are also a few with various issues occurring in them. It is important that these organizations are regulated properly and this usually means that employees aware of violations must report them. To encourage this, the law makes it illegal for companies to retaliate against employees who report violations. Experienced attorneys understand what to look at to prove these cases and may be able to guide one through it.