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Constitutional Issues

U.S. Federal Court Gives Constitutional Nod to New Hampshire Patriot Act Authorizing Daily Time for Public School Students to Cite the Pledge of Allegiance

In the most recent of legal challenges to the recitation of our country’s Pledge of Allegiance by public school students, the U. S. Federal Court of Appeals for the First Circuit rendered a decision last month in the case of Freedom From Religion Foundation v. Hanover School District, 09-2473. In this case, the Court upheld as constitutional […]

U.S. District Court Rules that Employees’ Social Networking Sites Are Discoverable in a Sexual Harassment Suit against Employer

In Equal Employment Opportunity Commission v. Simply Storage Management, L.L.C. and O.B. Management Services, 2010 U.S. Dist., LEXIS 527661, (“E.E.O.C. v. Simply Storage”) the United States District Court, Southern District of Indiana, was asked to decide a basic discovery issue in a novel context when the parties to this sexual harassment suit failed to agree on whether […]

School District’s Suspicionless Sweeps of School Parking Lots and Unattended Lockers Using Sniffer Dogs Upheld As Constitutional by Connecticut Superior Court

The Connecticut Superior Court in Burbank v. Canton Bd. Of Education,  2009 WL 3366272 (Conn. Super. 9/14/09)  ruled against parents and students who sought to prohibit the Canton Public School District from continuing its practice of using local police to conduct suspicionless sweeps of parking lots and unattended lockers at its middle and high schools using dogs […]

Obama’s Stimulus Package Offers COBRA Premium Reduction to Involuntarily Terminated Employees

The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985 (“COBRA”) provides for a temporary extension of employer-provided group health coverage, which is commonly referred to as COBRA continuation coverage. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (“Act”), which President Obama signed on February 17, 2009, includes several changes to COBRA continuation coverage that employers quickly need to address. The […]

FMLA: President Signs Military-Related FMLA Changes

On January 28, 2008, President Bush signed into law H.R. 4986, the National Defense Authorization Act for FY 2008 (“NDAA”). Section 585 of the NDAA amends the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (“FMLA”). The NDAA provides two new types of FMLA leave to employees with family members serving in the military: 1. Caregiver Leave: Permits […]

Emerging Category of Discrimination – Caregivers

On May 23, 2007, the Equal Employment Opportunities Commission (EEOC) issued guidance on the treatment of employees with “caregiver responsibilities.” While the federal discrimination statutes do not directly prohibit discrimination against “caregivers,” the new EEOC guidance does note that discrimination against caregivers that is grounded in a federally protected class, such as sex or disability, can […]

Supreme Court Ruling on Special Education

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) grants parents independent legal rights which encompass the entitlement to a free appropriate public education (FAPE) for their child.  The decision means that non-attorney parents can litigate IDEA claims in federal court unrepresented by legal counsel, because they are acting on […]

Federal Rules for Electronic Discovery

This past December, new Federal Court rules for electronic discovery went into place. In short, the rules require the retention and disclosure of electronically stored data, including e-mails, which relate to any federal court lawsuits in which the district is involved. Specifically, the new rules provide that (1) a party may serve interrogatories concerning and/or request […]