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Workers’ Compensation Retaliation

Being hurt on the job can be traumatic. If the injury is bad enough, it can mean true financial distress for you and your family. Some injuries can be career-ending, and some can be serious enough that you’ve got to take months or years off from work.

But sometimes, injuries can be infuriating, troublesome, traumatic and distressing, yet don’t require enough treatment to put you out of work for good or for so long that you need to take a leave of absence. Sometimes injuries can be dealt with rather quickly, and sometimes occasional treatment might interfere with or disrupt your working responsibilities, but only in a minor way.

Sometimes employers just don’t like the fact that you investigate, ask about, inquire about, pursue or file claims concerning your workers’ compensation rights.

The New Jersey workers’ compensation law prohibits retaliation against someone simply because he or she has pursued, inquired about or exercised his or her rights under the Workers’ Compensation statute. In the cases of Pierce v. Ortho Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and Lally v. Copy Graphics, Inc., the courts of New Jersey developed a doctrine called the “Workers’ Comp Retaliation” doctrine. This means that when an employer retaliates against you for having filed a workers’ compensation claim, you’re entitled to compensation.

That retaliation might be harassment where the employer exposes you to a hostile, intimidating or abusive working environment, perhaps by way of micromanagement, yelling, comments about you not really being hurt, or the like – or the employer may simply wrongfully terminate, wrongfully discharge, fire or demote you. There may be a failure to promote problem or the loss of responsibilities or other opportunities, as well.

Under the common law Pierce/Lally doctrine, you are entitled to compensatory damages for the pain and suffering this causes, and economic damages where appropriate. The New Jersey employment rights law firm of Costello, Mains & Silverman, LLC, and its attorneys have been assisting victims of workers’ compensation retaliation in the courts of New Jersey for nearly 30 years, and the firm is at the forefront in trying these cases and getting justice for injured workers who are further harmed by backlash.

Please call Costello, Mains & Silverman, LLC today at 866-944-3371 (toll-free) or contact us online to arrange a confidential consultation.