Plaintiff employee sued defendant university, alleging wrongful termination in violation of public policy. The Superior Court of Los Angeles County, California, granted the university’s motion for summary judgment based on the employee’s failure to exhaust the internal remedies available to her. The employee appealed.
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Overview
The employee worked for 21 years as a clinical laboratory technologist. The employee and a number of her coworkers were advised they would be laid off. The employee alleged that she continually reported laboratory abuses to the university including failure to comply with state regulations regarding reviewing lab results, and failure to comply in signing off those results, and that data from the lab was being falsified. She alleged she was wrongfully terminated and not rehired because of her whistleblowing activities. On remand, after appeal, the university alleged in its motion for summary judgment that the employee failed to follow the established grievance procedure. Because the appellate court had previously concluded that the employee had stated a common law cause of action for wrongful discharge in violation of public policy, the appellate court did not hold the university was immune. Nonetheless, the legislature had required the university employees to exhaust internal grievance procedures as a prerequisite to filing a whistleblower suit. The trial court properly granted the university’s motion for summary judgment.
Outcome
The appellate court affirmed the trial court’s judgment.
