Pfizer Must Pay $666,000 for FMLA Violation

Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer must pay $666,000 for violating the Family and Medical Leave Act rights of an employee fired after he took time off to adopt a child, the 4th Circuit has ruled.

The appeals court panel rejected Pfizer's argument that it could not retaliate against plaintiff James Dotson for taking two adoption-related leaves because he never actually applied for leave under the FMLA.

However, employees need not even to mention the FMLA to benefit from its protections, the appeals court said.

Pfizer failed to show that it inquired about Dotson's need for FMLA leave as required by the FMLA, the panel explained.

"Pfizer's legal argument would allow it to use its own failure to determine whether leave should be designated as FMLA-protected to block liability for retaliation," the court said.

"We decline to allow an employer to take advantage of its own lapse in such a way," it added.

Dotson worked in various sales and management positions at Pfizer for about 15 years before his 2003 firing. His performance ratings were good during that time, the complaint said.

In 2003 he and his wife made two trips to Russia to adopt a child. According to his lawsuit, Dotson kept Pfizer informed concerning his need for time off to complete the adoption, and no one at the company told him he could not make the trips.

However, Dotson was fired less than three weeks after returning from Russia with his newly adopted daughter.

The company said his performance had slipped and he had misused physician's sample drugs packets by passing along the antibiotic Zithromax to an orphanage in Russia, the opinion says.

Dotson explained that it was customary to bring gifts for the orphanage when seeking an adoption. However, Pfizer said the gift violated company guidelines for the use of the sample packets because his donation amounted to a quid pro quo with the orphanage, according to the opinion.

Dotson sued Pfizer in 2004 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina. He said the company interfered with the exercise of his FMLA rights and retaliated against him for taking leave.

After an eight-day trial in 2006 a jury found that Pfizer had interfered with Dotson's FMLA rights and discharged him in retaliation for exercising those rights.

It awarded him $666,000, including $333,000 in liquidated damages.

Pfizer and Dotson appealed to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which affirmed in part and remanded.

The appeals panel found sufficient evidence to support the jury's findings that Pfizer had interfered with Dotson's FMLA rights and that Dotson incurred actual damages (including the loss of paid vacation time) as a result.

Although it affirmed the lower court's rejection of Pfizer's motion for judgment as a matter of law and its decision not to award Dotson front pay because the amount was too speculative, the appeals court took issue with the District Court's decision to deny Dotson pre-judgment interest.

Under the FMLA an award of prejudgment interest is mandatory, not discretionary, and "automatically becomes part of the damages award under the plain terms of the statute," the panel explained.

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