Wrongful Termination???

Question

If someone is fired for putting "no" on their application for convictions of a felony or misdemeanor and the background results come back as "yes" for 2 misdemeanors but...1. The District Justice clarifies that only 1 is a misdemeanor after you speak with him. 2. You weren't sure so you asked your friend in Human Resources and after hearing everything you tell them about it they advise you to put "no" 3. You tell them that your friend in Human Resources advised you to put "no" but now your friend denies it 4. You have a taped phone confession of you and your friend where they admit they advised you 5. The background results they received are inaccurate yet still 1 misdemeanor shows up even though you weren't sure it was even a misdemeanor to begin with

Answer 1

well -

First on its basic level - If there is a Misdermeanor out there that shows up and you said no, then legally you lied on your application and you can be terminated.

If the Misdermeanor is not correct, then you need to clean that up with the courts. Until then, yes you have one and need to answer as yes.

Taped conversations without BOTH parties consent in the majority of states is Illegal Wire Tapping and opens a whole can of worms. Be very careful there on that.

Sorry - not wrongful.

Answer 2

IF you do have a misdemeanor on your record, then you should have put "yes". Regardless of what your 'friend' told you to put. You signed the application which means you are responsible for all the information you put on there. I am pretty sure your friend will not get in trouble, you should have told the truth IF you did in fact have a mark on your record. IF these misdemeanors are mistakes & you DO have a clean record then once you get the District Justice to clear you of them, I would go back to the job & re-apply.
Also, I don't think they can make a decision based on your background check. BUT if you LIE on your application, that is POSITIVE GROUNDS for termination!!

Good LUCK!!!

Answer 3

Sorry. You lied on the application, you got caught. So you got fired. How do you figure that as wrongful termination?

OK, so only one, not two, was a misdemeanor - but on your application, you said you didn't have ANY. And trying to blame your HR friend is a little lame. YOU are the one responsible for what you wrote, and you didn't tell the truth.

And by the way, in most circumstances, an employer doesn't even need a reason to fire you. It's called employment at will, and if you're in the US, is the law in most places. Run that one past your HR friend - they will have heard of it.

Answer 4

It would be nice for people to take responsibility for their own actions. The way that you are trying to displace blame onto your "HR friend" is a way to avoid the fact that at the end of the day, you are the one who chose to check the "no" box, it was a deliberate lie, and you did it anyway. Companies nowadays are so full of worries about ethics and SOX compliance that they cannot accept the liability associated with hiring someone who deliberately falsified their application - and why should they be expected to? While the company I work for would accept one misdemeanor, we do not hire people falsify their applications which is exactly what you did. I would suggest you accept this gracefully and learn this difficult lesson before you apply to another position. Anything less and you will be passed off as just another disgruntled candidate.

Answer 5

Even if you were not sure of the one misdemeanor, its still a misdemeanor, and since you put "no" ,in the company eyes, thats falsifying records or being deciteful...I don't think you were wrongfully terminated, but thats does suck especially if you were a good worker and the misdemeanor is a trivial one, which must be since you didn't think to put it. At least now you know, when you fill out your next application to make a check mark, and explain.

Answer 6

So sorry. Had you put the truth on your application and they turned around and fired you then you would have had a wrongful termination on your hands and filed a complaint with the EEOC. Unfortunately, the friend story doesn't play a role in your final decision to be untruthful. BUT if your friend is the HR person at this place then that's a different story and advice I would give. Is he the HR person at this place?

Answer 7

Nope, if someone falsely fills out an application I am pretty sure they can let you go, thats a big no-no.

Reality is that your excuses are not good ones, you've been convicted of crimes and don't even know what they are? if your friend gave you bad advice and told you to deceive them you should have known better.

Answer 8

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Answer 9

You lied on your application, which is always reason for termination.

Answer 10

You may be mislead. I would talk to a lawyer about it.