Opinion ID: 2464549
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Other state courts' application of the public policy exception in analogous labor arbitration cases

Text: Other state courts have followed the U.S. Supreme Court in adopting a public policy exception to the enforcement of arbitrators' reinstatements of employees discharged for misconduct. In fact, [i]t has become increasingly common for parties seeking to vacate arbitration awards to argue that the award should be vacated on the grounds that enforcement of the award would violate public policy. This trend has been most pronounced in labor arbitrations, particularly when employers challenge awards reinstating discharged employees. [19] Not surprisingly, awards reinstating law enforcement personnel are often challenged on public policy grounds. [20] In its briefing before the superior court, the State pointed to a Washington Court of Appeals case in which the court vacated an arbitrator's reinstatement of a Sheriff's Deputy who was terminated based on 29 instances of misconduct, including lack of candor. [21] The Washington Court of Appeals concluded that the Deputy's proven record of dishonesty prevents him from useful service as a law enforcement officer. To require his reinstatement to a position of great public trust in which he cannot possibly serve violates public policy. [22] But by the time the State filed its brief before this court, the Supreme Court of Washington had reversed the court of appeals's decision, holding that [e]ven if we were to agree that the arbitrator's decision was not good public policy and thought [the Deputy's] reinstatement distasteful, the County has failed to cite any explicit, well defined, and dominant public policy that requires vacating this award. [23] The other cases cited by the State as persuasive authority for vacating the reinstatement of a dishonest police officer involved substantially more egregious misconduct than the dishonesty alleged in the present case. In City of Boston v. Boston Police Patrolmen's Ass'n, the Massachusetts Supreme Court vacated the reinstatement of a police officer who insulted the occupants of a double-parked car, arrested two of them for disorderly conduct, handcuffed one to a wall and threatened him with violence, needed to be physically restrained by a sergeant, filed a knowingly untrue incident report alleging assault by the occupants of the car, then carried forward his deliberately distorted version of the event during the department's two-year internal investigation. [24] To have falsely arrested two individuals on misdemeanor and felony charges, lied in sworn testimony and over a period of two years about his official conduct, and knowingly and intentionally squandered the resources of the criminal justice system on false pretexts, [25] is misconduct of a different order of magnitude than the Trooper's dishonesty in the present case. Similarly, in Town of Bloomfield v. United Electrical Radio & Machine Workers of America/Connecticut Independent Police Union Local No. 14, which was later reversed on other grounds, a superior court in Connecticut vacated the reinstatement of a police officer where the arbitrators found [the officer] was untruthful in the statements he made during the course of his internal affairs interviews. [26] According to the arbitrators, the officer conducted a seriously flawed investigation and attempted to cover up his incompetence by fabricating the testimony of key witnesses. [27] The panel also found that [the officer] had not only been untruthful during the internal affairs investigation and disciplinary proceedings, but he was also untruthful in his testimony before the arbitration panel. [28] Again, this is dishonesty on a significantly different scale than the dishonesty of the Trooper in the present case. [29] In a more closely analogous case, a Florida District Court of Appeal upheld the arbitrator's reinstatement of the dishonest police officer. City of Tallahassee v. Big Bend Police Benevolent Ass'n involved a police lieutenant who lied to his chief regarding the existence of a romantic relationship with another police officer. [30] The court found without merit appellant's argument that the arbitrator's decision to reinstate a police officer. . . constitutes a violation of Florida public policy that police officers have good moral character. [31] In any case, comparisons to other jurisdictions can only go so far. American courts differ in their application of the public policy exception, [32] and the preceding cases rely on analyses of state law to determine the existence and nature of a public policy. What is at issue in the present case is the public policy of the State of Alaska. We turn now to an analysis of that policy.