5th Circuit delivers twofer win for employee

After having won its case at the trial court level, an employer recently received an unpleasant double whammy from the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals (which covers Texas). Defeat could have been avoided, however, if the employer had paid attention to just one key thing—timing. Read on.

January 2018 to March 2018

Denise Watkins is a black woman who suffers from severe anxiety. She was once a shift supervisor for the St. John the Baptist Parish Sheriff’s Office. A 17-year veteran of the force, she was commended in January 2018, along with three of her subordinates, for “superb work” by Lieutenant Marshall Carmouche. The lieutenant e-mailed the sheriff himself about the commendation, saying teamwork in the dispatch department led to the arrest of a suspect.

But dark clouds rolled in, and a mere 10 days after the e-mail, the lieutenant told Watkins she needed to do a better job of supervising her shift. By way of example, he told her she was missing license-plate-recognition hits, sleeping on the job, making personal calls at work, and failing to ensure emergency units were dispatched promptly. Note this: The window for written discipline came and went, not to return.

Then what happened? Yes, that’s right, on February 20, Watkins gave the lieutenant and his supervisor a doctor’s note that said, “Due to diagnosis of anxiety, [she] requires [three] 24-hour shifts/periods ‘off’ and free of responsibility per week.”