is this legal?

[sick of it]

I was working for a busy neighborhood bar/dance club. I worked there part-time for 6 weeks. One night I went in to work and wasn't feeling well, but still went in. Approimately 1 hour into my shift I had been to the bathroom, throwing up, twice. I have been sick at my stomach for a while and under doctors care. I had a colonoscopy only 3 days before. I explained all this to my asst. manager and told him I had to go home. I was too sick to work. He told me that we were understaffed and I could not go home. I said I would try to stay longer. Five minutes later I was sick again and went to the head manager. I told him I had to go home and he said I would be fired. I said I had to go and would discuss this later. We had a meeting earlier that day for the owners to tell us that their employees were their most important thing and we all sat and rewrote the club's mission statement. Then This? I talked to the owner and informed him of this today and he asked me to comeback and when i said i could not work for the same manager he assured me my managers were going nowhere and he agreed I shouldn't have had to stay, but said it was a busy night and acted like I had wasted his time calling him to tell him, if I didnt want my job back. Is it legal to fire someone because they had to leave in an emergency? Mind you I was very, very sick.

Please someone tell me if I am wasting my time looking into it.

-Karina

 

[Barbara B]

Call your state labor department and ask them. There may be some law in your state that protects you, but otherwise they'd come up with some excuse about repeated absences, attitude, etc.

 

[Attorney_Replogle]

Karina, definitely look through this site's attorney listings for a labor lawyer nearest you. Then contact him for the best answers. However, in general if you work in a state that is an "at-will" state, the employer can fire you at any time, with or without a reason. Except of course there can be no discrimination on a protected basis, such as disability. In your situation, you had a disability that prevented you from performing the tasks of your job that day. Whether you would be considered to have a disability as defined under the federal Americans with Disabilities Act, or your state's version of that law, I don't know. So contact the attorney and query him.

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Mark B. Replogle