[Download] "Cotran V. Rollins Hudig Hall International" by California Supreme Court * eBook PDF Kindle ePub Free
eBook details
- Title: Cotran V. Rollins Hudig Hall International
- Author : California Supreme Court
- Release Date : January 05, 1998
- Genre: Law,Books,Professional & Technical,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 90 KB
Description
When an employee hired under an implied agreement not to be dismissed except for "good cause" is fired for misconduct and challenges the termination in court, what is the role of the jury in deciding whether misconduct occurred? Does it decide whether the acts that led to the decision to terminate happened? Or is its role to decide whether the employer had reasonable grounds for believing they happened and otherwise acted fairly? The Courts of Appeal are divided over the question. The majority of California decisions suggest the jury's role is to decide whether the employer concluded misconduct occurred "fairly, honestly, and in good faith." That standard, or variations on it, appears to be the rule in most other jurisdictions as well. But at least one Court of Appeal opinion adopts a more expansive view. It holds the jury must decide whether the alleged misconduct occurred as a matter of fact, and places the burden of proving it on the employer. We granted review to clarify the role of the jury in litigation alleging breach of an implied contract not to terminate employment except for good or just cause, and to resolve the conflict among the Courts of Appeal. The better reasoned view, we conclude, prescribes the jury's role as deciding whether the employer acted with " 'a fair and honest cause or reason, regulated by good faith.' " That language is from Pugh v. See's Candies, Inc. (1981) 116 Cal. App. 3d 311, 330, 171 Cal. Rptr. 917 (Pugh I), the font of implied contract-based wrongful termination law in California. Recently, in Scott v. Pacific Gas & Electric Co. (1995) 11 Cal. 4th 454, 467, 904 P.2d 834 (Scott), we elaborated on the content of good or just cause by enumerating what it is not : reasons that are " 'trivial, capricious, unrelated to business needs or goals, or pretextual.' " (Quoting Wood v. Loyola Marymount University (1990) 218 Cal. App. 3d 661, 670, 267 Cal. Rptr. 230.)