Lawsuit-itis tickles lawyer's funny bone

By RICHARD CARELLI Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - Americans' growing tendency to sue each other rubs some politicians the wrong way, but it tickles Chicago lawyer Gerald Skoning's funny bone.

It's not that battling in court is funny, mind you. There are just so many "wacky" disputes and decisions to dissect. Employment law is Skoning's specialty.

Did you hear the one about the armored truck driver who had to sue to get his job back because he tried to rescue a woman from a knife-wielding bank robbery suspect?

While his partner was in a bank, the driver saw the bank manager run from the building screaming and being chased by a man with a knife. The driver locked his truck door and ran to help.

He was fired for violating a company rule against leaving a vehicle unattended.

The state's highest court ordered the driver reinstated, ruling that his firing "violates the public policy encouraging such heroic conduct."

"Much to my surprise after 30 years, they get wackier every year," Skoning says. "I get a kick out of collecting these stories."

For each of the last five years, his Top 10 lists have been published in The National Law Journal.

And although his clients mainly are employers sued by their employees, Skoning says his moonlighting is an "equal-opportunity" endeavor.

"Everybody is fair game. I've included stupid personnel decisions which we end up trying to defend," Skoning says.

Along with the fired Good Samaritan, this year's Top 10 list includes the supervisor from hell.

A temporary production worker at a publishing company says he walked 10 feet from his workbench to offer a co-worker a piece of gum. Shortly thereafter, his supervisor told him to place his right leg next to the bench leg, and then padlocked a chain around both.

Released after an hour, the worker finished out the day before resigning and suing for false imprisonment, outrageous conduct and "an extreme abusive work environment."

Skoning is not shy about holding up employees for ridicule as well.

On last year's list were the police department dog handlers who wanted to be paid for the time they spent commuting to work with their dogs.

They lost when a federal appeals court ruled that the mere presence of a dog "quietly occupying the back of the car" does not make the commute compensable.

Noted Skoning: "The court did not address other issues - such as whether the officers qualified for rush-hour car-pool express lanes" that are reserved for multiple-occupant vehicles.

A tenured teacher was fired from a technical college in Maine for kissing a student. He tried to get his job back by invoking a disability law and claiming protection as "sexually obsessive." He lost.

Courts can be targets, too. Skoning's 1994 list reported that the federal Environmental Protection Agency fired an employee who routinely slept on the job. He sued, claiming to have been discriminated against due to a handicap - severe bouts of depression.

A federal appeals court ordered a trial. "The government may presumably require its employees to stay awake as a matter of decorum," the appeals court said. "But that is not necessarily to say that an occasional nap would make any federal employee unfit."

Skoning's take? "For taking this strong position to protect the right of federal employees to sleep on the job, we salute the court of appeals."

<I>Richard Carelli covers the Supreme Court and legal issues for The Associated Press.<I>