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Discipline / Investigations

Charlotte-Meck teachers disciplined for Facebook postings

12/31/2008

Offensive postings on the social networking web site Facebook led the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools (CMS) to fire one employee and discipline seven others.

Worker’s hour count is off—Now what?

12/31/2008

Q. We do not believe that one of our employees is keeping accurate time records of her work. Can we pay her what we believe she worked instead of what her time records show?

The firing meeting: 4 classic mistakes

12/30/2008

Terminating an employee is one of the most stressful tasks managers and HR pros will ever have to face. Don’t let a difficult job turn into a legal nightmare too. Avoid these common firing mistakes, and you’ll probably avoid an expensive trip to court as well.

Follow up on complaints to ensure mistreatment stops along with harassment

12/24/2008

California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act protects employees from sexual harassment by co-workers. But what happens if management stops the harassment but the co-workers find other ways to make life miserable for their victims? It’s HR’s responsibility to make sure a victim of sexual harassment isn’t targeted for other mistreatment …

Track whom you discipline to avoid litigation

12/24/2008

Employees who are fired after breaking work rules often allege that they were targeted because of some protected characteristic like gender, age, race or ethnicity. The best way to counter such claims is to know beforehand whether your organization is being tougher on some employees who belong to a protected class while letting others slide.

Professor accused of swiping entire program

12/24/2008

New England College has filed suit against poetry professor Anne Marie Macari, alleging she stole its innovative master’s degree program in poetry and set up shop at Drew University in Madison.

Trenton power broker convicted of bribery and pension fraud

12/24/2008

Former state Sen. Wayne Bryant, once one of New Jersey’s most powerful politicians, was convicted of bribery and pension fraud for taking state jobs for which he did no work and steering state business to cronies in return.

Can employees plead the Fifth Amendment during an investigative interview?

12/18/2008

Q. Our company recently discovered some theft in our operation. We called an employee in for an investigative interview. He claimed to have consulted with an attorney and refused to answer our questions on the grounds that he could not be forced to incriminate himself under the Fifth Amendment. What are our choices?

No charges, but woman loses 2 jobs after bridge collapse

12/15/2008

Ramsey County prosecutors declined to file felony theft charges against Sonia Pitt, former director of homeland security and emergency management at the Minnesota Department of Transportation, finding her conduct in the wake of the deadly I-35W bridge collapse objectionable, but not criminal.

Reiterate your drug policies in wake of Prop 1 passage

12/12/2008

How Michigan’s new Medical Marijuana Act will affect employers has been hotly debated. Proposal 1, approved by voters in the November 2008 election, removed state-level penalties for registered patients who use or possess marijuana.