Hunton Employment & Labor Law Perspectives : Employment Lawyers & Attorneys : Hunton & Williams Law Firm : Labor Law Legislative Updates

Hunton & Williams client Sodexo Inc. announced last week that it has settled its civil RICO lawsuit against the Service Employees International Union, marking the end of the SEIU's contentious two year corporate campaign against the company.  Sodexo had alleged that the union conduct constituted extortion under RICO. Earlier this summer, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, in which the case was pending, denied the SEIU's motion to dismiss the case, finding that Sodexo had stated viable RICO claims.

Sodexo's racketeering suit is the latest in a series of recent RICO actions brought by major employers facing union corporate campaign attacks.  In 2008, Hunton & Williams brought a similar suit on behalf of Smithfield Foods, Inc., which alleged that the United Food and Commercial Workers Union had tried to extort Smithfield into recognizing the union as bargaining agent at Smithfield's Tar Heel, North Carolina plant.  That case survived both a motion to dismiss and summary judgment and settled on the morning of trial.  Other similar RICO cases, however, have not met with the same level of success.  In 2009, federal district courts in New York and Florida dismissed civil RICO claims brought against unions by Cintas Corp. and Wackenhut, respectively.

Read more from the Wall Street Journal and BNA. 

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The Texas Supreme Court officially closed the door on the ability of workers’ compensation claimants to seek supplemental relief under the Texas Insurance Code.  In Texas Mutual Ins. Co. v. Ruttiger, --- S.W.3d ---, No. 08-751 (Tex. Aug. 26, 2011), the Court held that the Texas Workers’ Compensation Act (“Act”) preempts claims against workers’ compensation insurers for unfair or “bad faith” settlement practices under the Texas Insurance Code. 

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Effective September 1, 2011, many Texas employers may no longer prohibit some employees from keeping guns in their vehicles while parked on company property. On June 17, 2011, Texas Governor Rick Perry signed SB 321, which amends Chapter 52 of the Texas Labor Code and makes it unlawful for a public or private employer to prohibit licensed or legally authorized employees from keeping a firearm or ammunition in a locked, privately owned vehicle in a parking lot, parking garage, or other employer-provided parking area. SB 321 will require many employers to revise the anti-weapon policies that likely have been in place for years.

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The focus on social media by the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or the “Board”) continues as evidenced by its recent report issued by Acting General Counsel Lafe Solomon.  The report discusses fourteen social media cases that were decided by the Board after Regional Directors submitted requests for advice to the Board’s Division of Advice.  The cases highlighted by Solomon give some insight to how the NLRB will handle various social media issues in the future.

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