A Ruling in the Churchill Case

The trialjudge has ruled for the University of Colorado, declining to reinstate Ward Churchill or award him front pay.  The case is here.  We will have more commentary later.

Comments

[Jim C.]

Here's a non-lawyer's observation, but perhaps fruitful in an appeal:

In short,the judge lacked an adequate basis to claim that reinstatement was untenable.

That's because his rationale for denying Churchill a reinstatement doesn't pass the evidence test. He clearly cherry-picked derogatory comments that Churchill had made about top-down interference from individuals who weren't even direct supervisors. But he IGNORED all of the positive comments Churchill made about wanting his job back, as well as the fact that he liked his students and most of his co-workers and direct supervisors, and had never had any employment problems until the political interference.

In other words, the judge failed to take into consideration any of the positive stuff in claiming that it was Churchill himself who had poisoned the well irreparably. The judge can't factor the employer's feelings when determining reinstatement (because that would always be automaticallty disqualifying) so he focused on Churchill's attitude. But he left out 90 percent of the story, and referred only to Churchill's statements about people who aren't even on campus or around the department, and would have no direct bearing on his day-to-day teaching duties.

If Churchill were a complete a-hole and had problems with everybody, the judge might have a reasonable basis to claim that the employment relationship was irreparably damaged. But that's not the case at all, Students and faculty members liked him and supported him. The judge seriously erred by not considering this fact when it came to determining whether or not a harmonious work environment could exist after reinstatement.

Even worse, his vacating the jury's decision only came about because he had eliminated any kind of relief for Churchill-- either reinstatement or front pay. He had to do it for this reason, but that's ass-backwards-- he did it to get out of the problem he had created for himself in denying reinstatement. His attempt to further cement this vacation by claiming that the Regents are a quasi-judicial body just opens up a huge can of worms, because they are not-- this opinion alone can be a frutiful avenue for appeal, and it's apparently quite controversial.

So in other words, the judge did not have a reasonable basis to deny reinstatement, because he ignored all of the positive comments from Churchill about CU and his job, and focused only on those derogatory comments that were made about higher ups not directly involved in the department's operation.