Court Opinion

ID: 9932167
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-02-09 18:32:22.007203+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:49:07.864849
License: Public Domain

The parties did not raise or argue the issue whether Rothenberger presented a prima facie case of retaliatory discharge merely by alleging that he filed a workers' compensation claim and two months later he was terminated from his employment.
Our supreme court has stated that a court cannot assume that "because [a worker] was terminated after he had filed [a workers' compensation] claim, the termination was retaliatory."Hayden v. Bruno's, Inc., 588 So.2d 874, 876 (Ala. 1991). The court, however, has not yet spelled out what more a worker must present — beyond the timing of the worker's injury and the worker's termination — to establish that he was fired "solely because" he had filed a claim for workers' compensation benefits. See § 25-5-11.1, Ala. Code 1975.