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Turrie Webb, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Worldwide Flight Service, Inc.
Case No. 04-11842
Appeal from the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida (No. 02-21758-CV-PCH). A federal judge has refused to dismiss a suit under the Family and Medical Leave Act brought by a former corporate vice president who claims he was told on the day he returned from a three-month leave that his job had been eliminated in a "restructuring" and that his new position came with a $20,000 pay cut. In her 12-page opinion in Heron v. American Heritage Federal Credit Union, U.S. District Judge Petrese B. Tucker found that a jury must decide two key factual disputes -whether a true restructuring ever took place and, if it did, whether it was truly planned prior to plaintiff Dennis Heron's FMLA leave. The decision rejects a summary judgment motion in which defense attorneys portrayed Heron as a worker who quickly grew unhappy with his job and complained during his one year of employment that he was "overwhelmed" with work he couldn't finish and was never given enough assistance. In their motion, defense attorneys Sandra A. Girifalco and Melissa C. Angeline of Stradley Ronon Stevens & Young argued that "the right to reinstatement under the FMLA is not absolute," and that Heron's complaints about his workload had led the company to consider restructuring its marketing department before Heron ever requested a leave. As a result, they argued, Heron was entitled only to reinstatement in the newly created position which paid less because it came with fewer responsibilities. But plaintiff's attorney William J. Fox argued in his reply brief that the defense motion "goes to great length to split hairs, ignore evidence and, frankly, misstate the facts of this case." Fox argued that American Heritage fell far short of its burden of proof for its claim that the elimination of Heron's position had nothing to do with his exercise of FMLA rights.
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