Wrongful Termination?
My situation is very unique.
I am a 20 year old black male. I worked for a private,family owned grocery store.
I was the first hired when it opened. And since my position, ive been asked to do thing I believe is immoral such as, using two chemical solutions known as acetone to remove expiration dates from products & as well as simply putting product on shelves that was previously covered with maggots, rather than my own option of either throwing away or disinfecting properly. However both of these tasks they requested me to do I refused to to the fact of me believing that erasing expiration dates with chemicals to be sold to the general public is JUST NOT RIGHT! Along with, of the maggots and the paint thinner/acetone I have footage of these product and moving bugs that I recorded on my iPhone, just incase I needed it for protection.
Anyways. I was terminated October 7th, and ironically the night before i has fell in a hole in the attic floor and hurt my leg as well as my back,as i fell in the hole and fell on my back, sorta hard to explain. Anyways, after I pulled my self out, i was feeling really weird, and requested a Workers Compensation Claim form, in which I was refused and told to “go home early” and was escorted off of the premises. And of course the next day I was terminated due to some BOGUS reason being that I “told the manager he was nobody”.
Earlier I had mentioned my ethnicity, the purpose of that was ironically after my termination the remainder of “black” people at my job were terminated as well, which raises question.
Also KTXL 40 wants to do a story on my situation, but rejected at this time because I am applying for unemployment and dont want to harm that…
Anyways, I am in California. And had question on if I had any possibility for a case.
@commonsense
oh wow.
1. actually i DO have the iphone 3GS. hypthetically speaking even if it was an iphone 3G i can jailbreak it to record video.
2. the job is predominately white, it is not normal to just completely terminate ALL black ethnic workers.
3. as farfetched as it sounds, this is actually the truth.
There’s more here than you’re telling.
1. Acetone is one chemical, not a combination of 2 different ones.
2. Unless you have the brand new Iphone 3GS, Iphones don’t shoot video.
3. You gloss over why you were terminated. “telling him he’s nobody” could have been insubordination…which is valid reason to terminate.
4. You honestly think because you were fired all the other black folks were too? There’s a reason in there somewhere…but you don’t give one.
5. Escorted off the premises for falling down? Hard to swallow.
I’m sure there’s a lot you left out.
Well you should have reported the employer when you were asked to remove expiration dates… you behaved unethically as well by doing something illegal (if you actually did it). It’s also unethical to continue working there and not reporting unethical activities that you see. If you have proof of the injury (doctor or hospital bill or statement with the date of services) and that it occured at work (possibly a coworker that witnessed this), and that you were then terminated the following day, then yes, you have a case. As for the illegal activities, you don’t really have a case because you didn’t do anything about them. If you’d reported it to the health department and then been fired, then you would have a case because of the whistleblower protection act.
first report the injury, since the employer refused, you do so through the state at:
http://www.dir.ca.gov/dwc/IandA.html
the state will resolve this part of your problem for you.
as far as the other issues;
you should have contacted the health department with your concerns and should do so now for the safety and health of others.
provide your evidence and they will deal with those issues.
as noted earlier if you had reported illegal activity to the proper agency you would have been protected by whistle-blower laws but that is a moot point now.
keep copies of all your evidence and the claims you file as they may assist you in becoming eligible for unemployment compensation.
California is an “at-will” employment state so unless you can prove that discrimination, retaliation or taking part in a protected activity was the sole reason for your termination there is simply no “wrongful termination” involved here.
the question for unemployment will be did the employer have “cause” to terminate you which the employer has to prove that they did …………
this is where the evidence of your other claims may come into play.
file for unemployment at:
http://www.edd.ca.gov/Unemployment/
i am not judging the merits of your claims or suggesting you or the employer did anything wrong. i just want to point you down the right roads to see this resolved.