Just Pucker Up and Blow

A whistleblower is a person who raises a concern about wrongdoings by a government agency, a state agency, or a private company. Whistleblowers frequently experience revenge when they have been found out. The term whistleblower comes from police officers who blow their whistles when they noticed the commission of a crime. The whistle would call attention to the danger. There have been many cases where punishment for whistle blowing has occurred. A whistleblower may be fired, suspended, demoted, and treated harshly by other employees.

The Whistleblower Protection Act protects federal whistleblowers, who work for the government and report agency misconduct. A federal agency violates the Whistleblower Protection Act if Agency authorities take or threatens to take a disciplinary action because of any disclosure of information by the employee. Whistleblowers may file complaints that she reasonably believes that there is a violation of a law, rule or regulation; gross mismanagement; gross waste of funds; an abuse of authority; or a substantial and specific danger to public health or safety. A whistleblower can’t be legally fired for telling all about her employer.

There has been a new case that has expanded this principle. Thompson v. North American Stainless, was published on January 24, 2011. Miriam Regalado, filed a sex discrimination charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) against her employer, respondent North American Stainless (NAS). Ms Regalado’s boyfriend Mr. Thompson worked for the same company. NAS fired Mr. Thompson after Ms Regalado filed her complaint. Thompson then filed his own charge and a law suit under the Civil Rights Act. Thompson claimed that NAS fired him to retaliate against Regalado for filing her charge. The first court dismissed Thompson’s suit on the ground that Thompson was not entitled to sue NAS for retaliation because he had not engaged in any activity protected by the statute. The second court agreed because Thompson was not the whistle blower his girlfriend was.

The United States Supreme court did not agree stating, “A reasonable worker obviously might be dissuaded from engaging in protected activity if she knew that her fiancé would be fired.”

There are many cases that deal with whistleblowers. There are also many laws on the books to protect them. So even if they are not employed by the federal government they may be protected. Whistleblowers play an important role in overseeing the business practices of companies and organizations. Under most state and federal laws, the whistleblower can be given legal protection. Sometimes they may be given monetary compensation for stepping forward and doing the right thing. Several large pharmaceutical firms have been targeted by whistleblowers for illegal activity recently. These companies have settled their cases outside of court. The companies were fined several million dollars which was paid to the federal government. The whistleblowers also received a cut of the monetary settlement.

For more information on this subject check out the web. There are many web sites that deal with this subject.