Opinion ID: 1359236
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: a jury instruction relieving an employer of liability for terminating an employee engaged in misconduct discovered after the employee is terminated is discordant with oklahoma retaliatory discharge jurisprudence and giving the instruction is reversible error.

Text: The employer asserts that under 85 O.S. 1991 § 5, [9] evidence of employee misconduct should be considered by the jury in determining damages and that the jury should have been instructed as such. Truckstops insists that the Court of Appeals did not expressly adopt Summers v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 864 F.2d 700 (10th Cir.1988), but it agrees with the appellate court that a Summers -type instruction should have been given. The employee argues that the Court of Appeals decision is in direct conflict with our decision in Buckner v. General Motors Corp., 760 P.2d 803, 810 (Okla. 1988). Truckstops' proposed jury instruction based upon Summers would bar any relief to the employee, if he engaged in serious misconduct, even if the misconduct were not discovered until after the employee's termination. [10] When reviewing jury instructions, the standard of review requires the consideration of the accuracy of the statement of law as well as the applicability of the instructions to the issues. The instructions are considered as a whole. [11] In giving instructions, the trial court is not required to frame issues, but it must state the law correctly. [12] In Summers, an employee filed suit against a former employer under Title VII for age and religious discrimination. The employer asserted that the reason for Summers' termination was a bad attitude and a poor rapport with co-workers and customers. Before being fired, Summers had been placed on probation for falsifying several claims documents; and he was warned that he would be fired if he engaged in further falsifications. Four years after discharging the employee, the former employer discovered 150 instances in which the employee had falsified company records. The employer argued that the 150 falsifications, unknown at the time of discharge, should be considered in determining the remedy available to the employee. The Tenth Circuit agreed with the employer, holding that while after-acquired evidence cannot be said to have been a `cause' for Summers' discharge in 1982, it is relevant to Summers' claim of `injury,' and does itself preclude the grant of any present relief or remedy to Summers. Thus, the Summers case fashioned a rule that an employer may avoid all liability for a discharge based solely on unlawful motives by proving that it would have discharged the worker if it had possessed full knowledge of the circumstances existing at the time of the discharge. While the Court of Appeals recognized that Summers differed factually from the present action, the Court found that the same issue was presented: whether an employee should be allowed to recover for wrongful termination when it is later discovered that the worker committed misconduct which would warrant termination. Although, the Court of Appeals recognized that Summers was not precedential authority, it found that it was highly persuasive and that it should be incorporated into Oklahoma's retaliatory discharge law. [13] The Summers rationale has not been extended beyond the context of civil rights employment discrimination violations. [14] The purpose of workers' compensation claims differ from civil right employment discrimination claims. [15] Title 85 O.S. 1991 § 5 protects the right of employees to assert claims for compensation without fear of reprisal or retaliation by employers. Applying a Summers instruction to workers' compensation claims violates public policy by allowing employers to circumvent the established workers' compensation structure. [16] Furthermore, by narrowly focusing on what may have been legitimate reasons for termination which surfaced after termination or after a suit had commenced, the jury would be distracted from the real issue of the case  the retaliatory motive of the employee's termination. [17] We have never applied the Summers rationale to a retaliatory discharge action based on 85 O.S. 1991 § 5. In Buckner v. General Motors Corp., 760 P.2d 803, 806 (Okla. 1988), this Court adopted jurisprudence developed in the law of employment discrimination pertaining to order and burdens of proof under 85 O.S. 1981 § 5. [18] In Buckner, we stated that the federal court standards we were adopting only applied to the specified principles discussed within the opinion. We further recognized that the principles we adopted were not to signal the wholesale adoption and application of federal law of employment discrimination to retaliatory discharge claims brought under § 5. The rule of law concerning retaliatory motivations under § 5 is stated in Thompson v. Medley Material Handling, Inc. 732 P.2d 461, 463 (Okla. 1987). In Thompson, we held that when retaliatory motivations comprise a significant factor in an employer's decision to terminate an employee, even though other legitimate reasons exist to justify the termination, the discharge violates the intent of § 5. This holding was reaffirmed in Buckner. [19] The employee relies on Mantha v. Liquid Curbonic Indus., 839 P.2d 200, 203 (Okla. App. 1992) to illustrate how Truckstops instruction would clearly violate principles set forth in Buckner and Thompson. The facts of Mantha are substantially similar to those presented here. The Mantha Court recognized that a ruling which would allow post-termination reasons for the employee's discharge to bar an employee's right to recover, regardless of the employer's wrongful conduct, would stand in direct conflict with our holdings in Buckner and Thompson. Even though it is not controlling, [20] Mantha is illustrative of the point that Truckstops' assertions are inconsistent with established Oklahoma precedent. An instruction based on Summers would absolve an employer upon a mere showing that the employer may have had a legitimate basis for discharge, even if it were not a significant factor in the employer's decision to terminate. This position is clearly inconsistent with Oklahoma retaliatory jurisprudence. The proposed instruction inaccurately states the applicable law. Because a jury instruction relieving an employer of liability for terminating an employee engaged in misconduct discovered after the employee is terminated is contra to the beaten track of Oklahoma law, we find that giving the instructions is reversible error.