Should You Sue Your Boss?

just because you can sue someone doesn't always mean that you should planning is branding in Robertson and I'm an employment lawyer for the context of this video I'm gonna presume two things number one that you have a good case and by that I mean your employer has done something illegal like wrongful terminations sexual harassment retaliation for complaining about an unsafe work environment things like that number two I'm gonna presume that a good lawyer is willing to take your case with that out of the way let's get to it in general there are four things that you should think about when considering whether or not you should file a lawsuit against your employer number one you should consider filing a lawsuit if the harm done to you involves a significant loss of money here's how I like to think about it let's say you have a $70,000 car parked in your driveway somebody steals it couple hours later the cops pull them over and arrest them well everyone thinks that you should get your car back right similarly let's say you're working a job making seventy thousand dollars a year then your employer does something illegal and fires you we are not making $70,000 a year anymore you've been deprived of that illegally well since the entire point of having a job is to earn money if somebody illegally deprives you of that finally in a lawsuit might be a very good option now filing a lawsuit doesn't make much sense if you've only lost a little bit of money here's how I like to think about it if you were making seventy thousand dollars a year and then you're fired illegally and then you get a new job just a couple days later making $80,000 a year well you were only out of work for a couple of days and then you covered all of your damages by getting a job that pays more it doesn't make any sense to file a lawsuit because the amount of money at issue simply doesn't just doesn't pencil out for anybody the costs will quickly the value of the case there are other forms that are more appropriate for small amounts of money like the labor board or the Department of Fair Employment and housing if you're in California or the EEOC or even small claims court number two you need to decide of helping other people is important to you or not the reality is is that private lawsuits from individuals just like you deter companies from doing bad things to other employees so especially morally repugnant cases like blatant racism sexual harassment or pregnancy discrimination companies are terrified of getting sued again or if they hear about other companies in their local city or town getting sued for these offenses they work extra hard to treat their employees with dignity and respect the reality is is that without private lawsuits from individuals just like you workplaces across the country and in California would not be as safe or as healthy a good example of this is California Health and Safety Code twelve seventy eight point five this law says that it's unlawful for a health care organization to retaliate against an employee for voicing concerns over patient safety so doctors nurses and other health care providers if they complain about something that they think is unsafe for patients they're protected under this whistleblower statute now this doesn't just protect the employees obviously it gives the healthcare organization a massive incentive to pay attention to patient C third you should think about filing a lawsuit if you've suffered significant emotional harm as a result of the unlawful activity California as well as other states allow employees in certain types of cases to recover emotional distress damages also known as pain and suffering damages in employment lawsuits why am I talking about this because this is one of the most significant components of the majority of our cases our clients suffer extraordinary emotional distress as a result of what happened at work but this isn't something that you can fake it's not like you can fake your way to millions of dollars by claiming you're upset when you're really you're gonna be examined by really competent experts by lawyers you're gonna be put in front of a jury and a judge and be examined in a way that it's impossible for you to be us your way to money it doesn't work like that so don't even try but if you are legitimately traumatized by what happened to you at work you're probably gonna have to go to therapy see psychologists psychiatrists to try to deal with these issues and then hopefully your lawyer will be able to prove that there's a significant monetary value to those damages however you need to understand that your lawsuit is going to be extremely stressful you're gonna have to relive what happened to you over and over again and you're going to be questioned on all aspects of your life so before you go out and file a lawsuit saying that you're emotionally traumatized think about whether or not you have the stomach and the wherewithal and the grit to persevere to the end so you have a good lawyer they will help you every step of the way but just be warned the lawsuit itself is very traumatizing number four you should only bring a lawsuit if you're willing to play the legal game look the justice system is far more concerned with what you can prove versus what is true and this is a massive mental hurdle for most of our clients they stay fixated on things that are not very important in the lawyer knows they're never gonna be able to prove and then they're perplexed why their lawyers are focused on things that don't seem relevant to them look follow your lawyers lead trust in the system because if you hire a good lawyer to begin with they're going to lead you to a successful resolution next you should only file a case if you're an honest person now I know it might seem a little bit weird saying that you should only file a case if you're an honest person because everybody thinks that they're an honest person but if you're being genuine with yourself and you told some lies you fibbed a little bit you exaggerated the numbers look your life is going to get miserable in a lawsuit because at worst you're gonna be in trouble for perjury when you lie under oath so don't even start a case if you know that you have a tendency to be less than truthful next do not file a case if you're not going to be patient the legal system is slow and I'm not going to even get into why that is but if you think that you're gonna speed up the case because you're a proactive person you're wrong the legal system takes a long period of time and your lawyers only have a tiny amount of control over that so don't hammer your lawyers for the case taking a long time don't call them once every other day that's a waste of everybody's time just let the system work trust your lawyer and be patient we should talk for a second about your lawyer do not file a case and I repeat do not file a case unless you have confidence in your lawyer this is so important at the start of the case everything is easy six months in everything is hard so if you don't trust your lawyer at the beginning of the case what do you think is gonna happen when things get difficult look it's simple if you don't trust your lawyer at the start of the case go get a different lawyer next you should only pursue a claim and this is really important if you believe in your cause if you're not outraged about what happened to you then you're not going to win if you're relatively apathetic about what happened to you don't pursue the claim to begin with because success in these difficult difficult lawsuits is predicated upon what you say to the jury and the jury thinks that you don't care they're certainly not gonna let you win oh man I'm tired of talking if you appreciated this video please give it a thumbs up now I really want to hear what the YouTube community thinks of this subject if something illegal happened to you at work would you file a lawsuit assuming that all these boxes will checked I'd like to know so let me know in the comments section finally if you want to see more videos like this from me in the future go ahead and hit the subscribe button that will help YouTube know that what I'm doing is valuable ok let's finish up the point of me making this video is to help you decide whether or not you're gonna pursue a case or not pursue a case the beautiful thing is that this is your choice if you decide to pursue a case good for you if you decide not to pursue a case good for you I'm gonna go erase the whiteboard and I will see you at the next video take care [Music]

Channel: Branigan Robertson

Views: 35,046

Rating: 4.9380379 out of 5

Keywords: sue your boss, employment lawsuit, employment lawyer, employment law, wrongful termination, sexual harassment, sue your employer, bad boss, sue boss, boss lawsuit

Id: rwg-9NabIhQ

Length: 9min 26sec (566 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 22 2019