Tag: at-will employment

‘Substantial Truth’ Defeats Wisconsin Plaintiff’s Tortious Interference Suit – 7th Circuit

In Wesbrook v. Ulrich 2016 WL 6123534, the Seventh Circuit examined the reach of the truth defense to a tortious interference with contract action stemming from a bitter dispute between a prominent Wisconsin medical clinic and one of its high-level employees.

The plaintiff sued a former co-worker and ex-supervisor for tortious interference with contract claiming the two worked in concert to engineer the plaintiff’s firing from the clinic.  The plaintiff claimed the defendants repeatedly made critical statements about him to third parties that resulted in his being ostracized by clinic staff and ultimately let go.  The District Court granted summary judgment for the clinic and the plaintiff appealed.

Held: Affirmed.

Reasons:

To prove tortious interference with contract in Wisconsin, the plaintiff must show (1) a valid contract or a prospective contractual relationship with a third party, (2) defendant’s interference with that relationship, (3) interference by the defendant that was intentional, (4) a causal connection between the interference and damages, and (5) the defendant wasn’t justified or privileged to interfere.

To sue a co-worker for tortious interference, the plaintiff must show (1) that the employer did not benefit from the co-worker’s/defendant’s statement, and (2) the co-worker’s act was independently tortious (i.e., fraudulent or defamatory).

Whether conduct or a statement is privileged is a fact-driven question that looks at the nature, type and duration of the conduct and whether the conduct was fair under the circumstances.  But where the challenged statement is true, it is privileged as a matter of law.  There can be no cause of action aimed at a true statement; even one motivated by ill will toward a plaintiff.

The same holds for “substantially true” statements.  Even where a statement isn’t 100% accurate, so long as it’s true in most of its particulars, it’s still privileged and will defeat a tortious interference claim.  Tort law does not demand “artificial precision” in common use of language.

Here, the defendants’ challenged statements concerning plaintiff were substantially true.  Defendants’ verbal and written assertions that plaintiff had an autocratic management style, threatened his subordinates, and that several employees had lodged complaints against him were true enough to defeat plaintiff’s claims.  While there were arguably some factual specifics that were either embellished or omitted from the statements, the Court viewed their substance as sufficiently accurate to negate plaintiff’s tortious interference suit.

The Seventh Circuit also based its decision granting summary judgment for the defendants on policy grounds.  It reasoned that if a plaintiff could sue a co-worker every time he believed that co-worker instigated or contributed to the firing decision, it would swallow up the general rule that at-will employees cannot sue for breach of contract where they are fired without warning or cause.

Afterwords:

1/ An interesting case in that it examines the tortious interference tort in the factually anomalous setting of an at-will employee suing his co-workers instead of his employer after a discharge;

2/ The key holding from the case is that truth is a defense not only to defamation but also to tortious interference with contract under Wisconsin law;

3/ A statement’s truth is construed flexibly: it doesn’t have to be completely accurate.  Even if there are exaggerated aspects of a statement, so long as the statement meets the substantially true test, the speaker will be privileged to tortiously interfere.

The Fifield Case: Two Years of Continuous Employment = Sufficient Consideration to Enforce Restrictive Covenants

In Fifield v. Premier Dealer Services, Inc. 2013 IL App (1st) 120327, http://www.state.il.us/court/Opinions/AppellateCourt/2013/1stDistrict/1120327.pdf the Court squarely held that two years of continued employment is required to uphold a noncompetition or nonsolicitation provision.

 Facts and Procedural History

Plaintiff resigned about three months after starting his job as an insurance salesman and went to work for a competing firm.  He preemptively sued his former employer seeking a declaration that the noncompete he signed wasn’t enforceable. employment contract were unenforceable.  The trial court agreed and granted summary judgment   for the plaintiff.  The employer appealed.

Held: Affirmed. 

Rules/Reasoning:

Court rejected the employer’s two main arguments: that (1) the two-year consideration rule didn’t apply because the Plaintiff signed the restrictive covenants before he was hired (and so this wasn’t really a post-employment restriction at all); and (2) the offer of employment itself was sufficient consideration to support the noncompete and nonsolicitation provisions – since Plaintiff was free to refuse to sign the employment contract and go work somewhere else. 

The Court held it didn’t matter whether Plaintiff signed the covenants before or after he was hired since at-will employment can constitute an “illusory benefit” as the employer can fire (and the employee can quit) at any time for any reason.

The Court also held that the two years of continued employment consideration rule applies even where an employee resigns on his own (like Plaintiff).  Fifield, ¶ 19.  And since Plaintiff was only employed for a little more than 3 months after he signed the noncompete, this fell far chronologically short of the requisite two-year period.  Fifield, ¶ 19.  In addition, the “first-year provision” (Plaintiff’s firing without cause during first employment year nullifies restrictive covenants) didn’t affect the Court’s analysis: “at most, [Plaintiff’s] employment was only protected for one year, which is still inadequate under Illinois law.”  Id.

 Take-away: Fifield could spell trouble for employers because it seems to open the door for employees to breach restrictive covenants with impunity – so long as they resign within two years of their start date.  The case also shows that courts may view at-will employment as “illusory benefit” and deem such employment insufficient consideration to enforce post-employment restrictions.  In addition, based on the Court’s discussion of the “first year provision”, employers may be well-served by providing that restrictive covenants won’t bind the employee if he’s fired without cause within two years of his start date.  This would seem to make it easier for an employer to argue that post-employment restrictions are enforceable.