I live in New York. I filed a complaint against an employer in 2008 for wrongful termination, and the complaint contained allegations of discrimination. In 2011, the court ruled against me in summary judgement. Since then, I have often run into the situation where employers find Google search results referencing the case and they pass based purely on the search result. In order to give myself a semblance of a chance I have reached out to the many websites online that focus on publishing court records. Understanding, the delicacy of the situatuion I am in, all of them have agreed to make my case not searchable from Google to their sites except one of them, Leagle.com. Given all of the other sites had the decency and understanding to honor my simple request, I'm hoping there is some leverage I can exert over the one seemingly callous holdout. I have been pleading with the owner of this website for over a year to no avail. Can someone please over any advice that may help?
Two facts you have to live with, Xtraordinaryman: One is that public records can be published legally online with very few exceptions and, two is that you cannot force a company that is operating within the law to change their policies if they do not want to.
Leagle.com publishes court documents that are legally available to anyone. They just make the cases easier for people to access. Like newspapers, their policy is to not remove what they have legally published absent a court order to do so.
Here is a link to Leagle.com, with contact information:
http://www.leagle.com/about-us
You can locate an attorney in your area to discuss the matter but, short of a company policy change by Leagle.com, I think you are going to have to accept that the case can be found with an online search and be proactive when dealing with prospective employers.
I suggest you do not let prospective employers find out about your wrongful termination/discrimination case through an online search. Be upfront about the case that they are going to discover anyway. It is part of your history that should be disclosed so you can get that out of the way. It may not work to get you a job (employers are reluctant to hire people who have filed complaints against their employers in the past), but your honesty about the matter may help you find an employer willing to hire you.
