In addition to the other remarkable features of the Sixth Circuit's ruling in Jones v. Nissan North America, No 09-5786 (August 18, 2011), that were discussed in a previous post, Employee "Regarded As" Suffering From Disability Where Employer Fabricated Work Restriction and Failed to Conduct Individualized Inquiry Regarding Employee's Actual Medical Condition, Sixth Circuit Rules, the Court also undertook to consider and ultimately reject application of the after-acquired evidence doctrine.
After Nissan fabricated a work restriction applicable to Jones and then used that fabricated restriction to run him out of its workforce, Nissan placed Jones on unpaid medical leave. Jones wasn't technically terminated; he just did not work, was not paid and had no benefits. After a few months of this and in order to support his family, Jones went out and got a job, but he didn't get Nissan's permission to do so beforehand. Later, when Jones filed suit over Nissan's fabrication of the work restriction, Nissan argued successfully in the district court that Jones's remedies should be reduced under the after-acquired evidence doctrine recognized in McKennon v. Nashville Banner Publ'g Co., 513 U.S. 352 (1995). McKennon stands for the proposition that the remedies of a wrongfully terminated employee may be limited where the employer discovers after the fact grounds on which it claims it could and would have fired the employee anyway.
Jones's situation had a twist, though. His allegedly wrongful act -- going out and getting a job to support his family without Nissan's permission and after Nissan had fabricated a work restriction to get him out of its workforce -- occurred long after the effective and practical termination of Jones's employment by Nissan. After surveying the caselaw and concluding that the authorities were split on whether the after-acquired evidence doctrine applied in this situation, the Sixth Circuit concluded that it did not based on a simple, tort-like proximate causation analysis:
Were it not for Nissan's wrongful imposition of medical restrictions rendering Jones medically unfit for any position that Nissan, Jones would not have been in the position of seeking employment without Nissan's permission in violation of its rules. Without Nissan's wrongful conduct, Jones would not have violated any rule. We therefore conclude that it was error to give the McKennon instruction limiting damages.
