Court Opinion

ID: 9479771
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 07:28:41.669366+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:47:16.337674
License: Public Domain

VAN GRAAFEILAND, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
Because, unlike my colleagues, I believe that a determination as to the propriety of Irwin Heller’s discharge on October 1,1982 should be based on what he did and said prior to his discharge rather than on his carefully rehearsed testimony given almost five years later, and because my concept of what constitutes employee loyalty differs markedly from that of my colleagues, I dissent.
Prior to the 1982 meeting, Heller’s supervisors had been informed that Heller was secretly recording conversations with his superior officers. When confronted with this accusation, Heller disclosed that he had a recorder on his person at that very time. He told his superiors however, “OK, the tape recorder is not on.” He lied. Unbeknownst to his superiors, Heller was taping the entire meeting. As a result, there can be absolutely no question as to what each person said at that meeting. The following are illustrative excerpts:
Heller: Yes, I understand that. I’m not going to discuss it in great, great detail, but very briefly, and this is not to be boastful but I have three different law firms that are anxious for me to sue because of the very hard, hard evidence ... documentation, but I have been reluctant to do that. But I am willing to divulge some of it in Harry Dodds ... in front of Harry Dodds with Andy Sigler ... and ... as evidence of the fact that ... I’m reluctant to do that, that was not my style. And I didn’t want to be dragged down to this level, but, my hand is being forced. And I think ... you know, it’s regrettable but I think before this is over — and I said this to you the last time — I think the company is making a big mistake. Be that as it may, I mean, I have seen this coming for a long time. I can only tell you that ...
Foster: How long? How long have you seen it coming?
Heller: At least three ...
Foster: Three or four years?
Heller: I want to tell you that every conversation we’ve had is on a tape recorder and there are an awful lot of lies.
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Heller: OK, OK. You know, I still am saying to you now, and I’m not going to plead for my job at all because I think the conditions are intolerable at this stage of the game, but ... I didn’t intend to come in to warn you ... but I advise you ... I advise this company that I’m not talking about an EEO ease, I’m talking about something that’s going to be a bloody mess. I’m a far bigger fighter than you people imagine. And I think you’re more vulnerable than you imagine. And I think I would like Andy Sigler to know it without [inaudible].
*438Foster: Just a couple of ... tape recorders are not illegal.
Heller: That’s the least of my evidence.
Foster: I am not finished ... when you’re dealing in a business relationship with a superior and a subordinate and conversations and their business content necessarily have to be confidential. There is no excuse for tape recording conversations. That is grounds for dismissal for cause.
Heller: That’s very true. That's true.
Heller: Because of what had been transpiring for years, I’ve got documentation. I’ve written all the things that have transpired.
Heller: I’ve tape recorded my conversation with John for years.
Gardner: Why?
Heller: Because the man has lied to me and I have got the documentation to prove it. He’s lied to me constantly. And if you say that that’s going to be the reason ...
Gardner: [inaudible] you taped?
Heller: Absolutely.
Gardner: [inaudible] you taped?
Heller: Absolutely.
Gardner: On your person somewhere?
Heller: Absolutely.
Gardner: Oh, Jesus Christ, Irwin.
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Foster: You wanted to come over here and talk with Don Gardner to divulge
Heller: No, I didn’t, I didn’t ... no, that’s not true either. You didn’t hear me carefully. I said that I am ready to divulge very hard documentation to Harry [inaudible] that makes attorneys that I have spoken to anxious to want to take on the corporation and which I have refrained from getting involved in. I could have started a law suit.
Gardner: [inaudible]
Heller: It’s not my style.
Foster: Even though you have compiled all this information?
Heller: Well, I took the tapes ...
Foster: ... in the last four or five years.
Heller: That’s right.
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Foster: You don’t even care about the company. You’ve been disloyal to us.
Heller: Disloyal? What? ...
Foster: For this thing you’re holding in your hands. You’ve been doing it for five years [inaudible] your supervisors.
Heller: I’ve been defending, I’ve been defending ...
Heller’s superiors learned in 1982 that he was a paranoid conniver and sneak. They learned after this lawsuit was begun that he also was a liar. My colleagues say that, despite all the foregoing undisputed and undisputable words from Heller himself, the defendant was required to keep him in its employ. I disagree. I would not have a man such as this working for me. Moreover, I am satisfied that, if either of my colleagues discovered that one of his clerks had been secretly recording the judge’s statements to him, that clerk’s employment tenure would be as short as was Heller’s. Almost two thousand years ago, Seneca, the Roman philosopher, wrote “Loyalty is the holiest good in the human heart.” 1 If there is exaggeration in this statement, it is minimal. Loyalty is what one looks for in a spouse, what a country expects of its citizens, and what an employer is entitled to receive from his employees. “There is no more elemental cause for discharge of an employee than disloyalty to his employer.” NLRB v. Local Union No. 1229, International Brotherhood of Electric Workers, 346 U.S. 464, 472, 74 S.Ct. 172, 176, 98 L.Ed. 195 (1953).
Loyalty to his employer is what caused Mark Davenport to go to both his minister and his lawyer seeking advice about whether to disclose to the employer that Heller was secretly recording conversations. Unlike my colleagues, I would not term an employee who does this “unfaithful.” *439Here was a man who was sorely troubled by the knowledge that his friend was doing something that he believed, and I believe, clearly was wrong. He sought advice from the best sources he knew, his minister and his lawyer. I regret that my colleagues see fit to pat Heller on the back for his contemptible conduct while they castigate Mark Davenport for doing what his conscience and his advisers told him was the proper thing to do.
I regret also that, as a result of our ruling in this case, every disgruntled employee in the Second Circuit henceforth will feel free to report to work with a tape recorder hidden on his person.

. "Fides sanctissimum humani pectoris bonum est." Seneca, Ad Lucillium, Epis. 88, 29 quoted in The MacMillan Book of Proverbs, Maxims and Famous Phrases 746 (1948).