Employer Terminated Employee for Misusing Family Leave

October 1, 2003

By: Barbara L. McCully

In McDaneld v. Eastern Municipal Water District Board, 109 Cal.App.4th (2003), the appellate court sustained defendant's motion for summary judgment in a suit brought under California's Family and Medical Leave Act, finding that the employer could properly terminate plaintiff for abusing leave under the Act.

On January 21, 1998, plaintiff requested family medical leave from January 23- January 30 to care for his father during and after ankle surgery. On January 22, his father was released from the hospital and stayed at plaintiff's house until January 29. During that week, plaintiff played golf and worked intermittently on his sprinkler system. On January 29, plaintiff drove his father to his father's place of work to pick up his car and the father drove alone to his own home. Although plaintiff claimed that he stayed overnight in the area to be with his father the facts revealed that he had driven home. On January 30th, plaintiff did not return to work, claiming that he stayed at home to help his pregnant wife who had injured her back.

Defendant interviewed plaintiff regarding these matters, found that plaintiff had lied to investigators and had abused his leave; as such, he was terminated. Plaintiff requested a review before an internal Discipline Review Committee, which recommended that plaintiff be reprimanded, not terminated. The general manager rejected the recommendation on the grounds that Plaintiff had abused his leave and had been untruthful during the investigation, rather than return to work. Therefore, the general manager approved the termination.

Plaintiff filed a petition for writ of mandate seeking reinstatement to his position. He claimed that (1) playing golf and working on his sprinkler system was not inconsistent with caring for his father, (2) even if it was, he did not realize that such activities would be considered as abuse of his leave of absence because defendant had not disseminated information about what would be considered an abuse of the leave policy, and (3) even though his leave for purposes of caring for his father had been completed a day earlier than expected, he was entitled to family and medical leave on the last day to care for his wife.

The trial court denied plaintiff's petition for reinstatement and the appellate court affirmed, finding that an employer may properly terminate an employee where the employer reasonably believed that the employee was misusing family and medical leave.

In some circumstances, an honest mistake may excuse a trivial misuse of family and medical leave, and an employer's failure to advise about employees' rights regarding use of leave may preclude an employer from terminating an employee for misuse of the leave. However, the critical issue in most cases will be whether the employer had a good faith and reasonable belief that the employee misused family leave.

Although the court agreed with the employer that plaintiff had lied about staying home the final day to care for his wife, it found that, even if plaintiff had been mistaken about whether he had to return to work on the last day of the leave, the employer was justified in concluding that plaintiff had misused the leave in other ways and was untruthful in the investigation of the matter allowed defendant to terminate him.