Wrongfull

Wrongful termination, in simple terms, means that a person’s employment has been ceased in an unfair or unjust manner. However, because there is no single wrongful termination law, not every case of an unjust termination qualifies legally for a wrongful termination lawsuit.

Wrongful termination is probably the most common term people use to refer to this situation…other common terms include:

• Illegal discharge
• Illegal dismissal
• Illegal termination
• Wrongful firing
• Wrongful dismissal
• Wrongful discharge

The key concept is that an employer must discharge an employee illegally for this type act to qualify as wrongful termination.

If the employment termination isn’t illegal, then it is not “wrongful termination” in a legal context, even though it may be unfair or immoral.

An example of wrongful termination that’s illegal:

An employer fires an employee because of race, creed, color, or age,  in clear violation of a state or federal employment discrimination law. In this case, then the employment termination is illegal and most likely qualifies as wrongful termination.

An example of wrongful termination that is not illegal

A company unfairly fires an employee because of an  personality conflict with that employee’s manager. While perhaps unfair, this situation is unlikely to qualify as wrongful termination in the legal sense.

What is wrongful death?

A wrongful death lawsuit makes the claim that a person was killed as a direct result of negligence of the person or company that is being sued, and that the victim’s surviving family or beneficiaries are entitled to compensation in the form of monetary damages.

A wrongful death claim is not the same as a normal negligence lawsuit, which is usually filed by the person who was injured. In the early days of our country’s existence, wrongful death claims did not exist…the claim effectively died with the victim. The surviving family, then, was unable to claim damages from the person responsible for the death of their loved one.

Individual states have, over time, passed laws to address the wrongful death situation. These laws enable compensation for persons who are affected by the death of the victim, and create a legal  incentive to parties to act carefully and safely. Each of our 50 states now have some form of support for wrongful death claims.

While each states laws for  wrongful death were created independently, they do follow the same patterns.  A wrongful death lawsuit usually has four major tenets:

• the death was caused, either in whole or in part, by the defendant’s  conduct
• the defendant was either negligent or directly liable for the death of the victim
• a surviving family, beneficiaries or other dependents exists
• the death of the victim created demonstratable monetary damages