Posts Tagged ‘IIED’

U.S. Case — $11.65 Million Jury Award

Friday, May 15th, 2009

U.S. Emotional Distress Case Draws Record $11.65 Million Jury Award
Associated FMLA Violation by Employer

by Dee McAree
The National Law Journal
11-11-2002

A case in which an employee charged that he was retaliated against for taking time off under the Family Medical Leave Act to care for his aging parents has triggered an $11.65 million award.

The recent Chicago verdict — one of the largest won under FMLA — is just one of many that employment lawyers say they expect to see as baby boomers are faced with the predicament of caring for aging parents. In 1998, Chris Schultz, a 25-year veteran employee of Christ Hospital and Medical Center in Oak Lawn, Ill., was the esteemed “MVP Employee” with his picture hanging in the hospital lobby.

But two years later, he was out of a job. Lawyers for the 45-year-old Schultz sued the hospital in Schultz v. Advocate Health, No. 01C-0702 (N.D. Ill. June 5, 2002), claiming that he was unfairly penalized for taking time off to care for his aging parents.

Schultz, who worked in maintenance, was entitled to take 12 weeks intermittently over the course of a year after his request for family medical leave was granted in 2000. (more…)