Court Ruling on Blog could Make Employers Sweat
Submitted on Wed, 02/20/2008 - 5:47pm
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By Rick Haglund - Thursday, February 14, 2008, Grand Rapids Press, Detroit Bureau
There probably are lots of workers who would love to create Web sites dedicated
to getting their bosses fired.
But the very real likelihood of losing
their jobs provides a big incentive for employees not to post their negative
thoughts about The Man (or The Woman) in cyberspace.
Generally, employers
have the legal right to prevent workers from using personal Web sites, or blogs,
to malign supervisors and co-workers, or damage an employer's business
reputation.
But a recent state Court of Appeals decision, which
reinstated a Detroit police officer who was fired for keeping a personal blog
his boss didn't like, should give employers pause. Officer John Bennett didn't
much care for Jerry Oliver, the city's police chief at the time, so he created
the site, http://firejerryo.com, in
2002.
Bennett first was suspended and then fired in 2003 because Oliver
claimed the site contained negative racial overtones, damaged the reputation of
the Detroit Police Department and compromised public safety.
In a Dec. 4
ruling, the state Court of Appeals disagreed and ordered Bennett reinstated with
back pay.
The court rejected the city's claims the site damaged the
police department or harmed public safety.
It did note the site "included
some comic relief and 'edgy' criticism of department officials."
The
ruling isn't directly applicable to private-sector employers because it dealt
mainly with alleged violations of the state public employment relations act. But
here's the part that could make business employers sweat: The appellate court
said Bennett's blog constituted "concerted activity" protected by state
law.
In other words, Bennett wasn't on a one-man mission to get Oliver
fired. The court said his blog was protected because it provided a forum for
other officers to express their concerns about working conditions in the
department and induced group activity "for the mutual aid and protection of
fellow police officers ..."
Workers in the private sector have similar
protections, says Miriam Rosen, an employment law expert in the Bloomfield Hills
office of Detroit-based law firm Butzel Long.
That makes businesses
vulnerable to claims of protected concerted activity by employees who blog,
Rosen said.
Rosen says e-mail, blogs and social networks such as Facebook
are creating "a collision between the existing rules of conduct in the workplace
and new ways of communicating between employees."
And the courts aren't
keeping up with the technology in addressing these conflicts, she
says.
The best way employers can cope is to make sure they have policies
in place that establish clear rules about cyberspace
communication.
Basically, rules against such things as sexual harassment
and divulging confidential business activities need to be extended to employees'
use of the Internet, she says.
And what about Bennett? His new blog, http://detroituncovered.com, takes aim at
the foibles of an even bigger fish -- Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick.