Suing Employer For Emotional Distress
Although states vary in their interpretations of the necessary elements to prove the tort, it is generally agreed that the employee will need to prove that the employer’s acts actually occurred, that they were intentional (or grossly negligent), and that the employer’s actions were the legal and factual cause of the employee serious emotional distress.
Proving An Infliction of Emotional Distress Claim
If you suffered serious emotional injuries resulting from your employer’s actions or as a result of your employer’s agents who, at the time, were acting in the scope of their employment, you might be able to sue for damages.
Under the law, the following elements of the tort of intentional or negligent infliction must be proved by a preponderance of the evidence:
- Your employer engaged in negligent or intentional conduct against their employee
- The conduct was extreme and outrageous
- The employee experienced serious emotional distress
- The employer’s conduct must have been the legal and factual cause of the employee’s emotional distress.
Invading The Employee’s Privacy
The employer might be sued for invasion of privacy and infliction of emotional distress. This can result in economic and general damages, but if egregious enough, also punitive damages.
Some employers search their employees’ clothing, purses, or desks at the workplace. Whether that’s legal depends on whether their state has laws prohibiting them from conducting searches. Although there is usually no precise rule on whether a search is legal, it might turn in large part on:
- Whether the job poses particular dangers of violence or theft.
- Whether the employer has specific information justifying a search (e.g., missing office equipment).
- Whether the employer has given workers prior, notice that searches are to be expected.
Can the employer watch or photograph their employees?
It depends on whether your state has laws prohibiting the surveillance of workers.
The surveillance must not be unreasonably intrusive on the employees’ privacy. Even if laws protect workers from some forms of surveillance, it’s been legally allowed so long as the monitoring was for a legitimate work purpose and the workers were notified of the monitoring beforehand.
For example, putting a visible camera in your work area is legal. On the other hand, it is illegal to arrange a camera in a bathroom or a changing room unless there is some compelling reason to do so – such as reporting that drug sales were occurring in the bathroom.
This area of the law is complicated, so you should check with a lawyer to see if your state has strong privacy protections for workers.
Can the employer listen in to employee phone calls?
If you have a good reason to listen to your employees’ calls (e.g., to find out how they treat your customers over the phone), you can monitor the phone calls as long as you notify the employees beforehand.
On the other hand, listening to another’s conversation might be an invasion of privacy and constitute emotional abuse – especially if you listen to phone calls without a business reason to do so.
If the phone call involves customer contact, you must first obtain the customer’s consent. That’s why you hear those phone recordings saying, “This call may be monitored or recorded for quality control purposes.”
No doubt, the term’s meaning for quality control purposes is so open to interpretation that it can mean almost anything – even if the real and prohibited reason was to annoy, vex, or otherwise harass the employee.
Liability Against Employer For Acts Of Their Employees
To prevail against the employer for an employee’s extreme and outrageous conduct, the employee will have to prove that the employer possessed actual knowledge of the extreme and outrageous behavior and knew that it was harmful conduct. Still, the employer failed to take reasonable action to prevent it.
Proving Emotional Damages
Since emotions are subjective, proving your damages can be problematic. The employee must be prepared to demonstrate the emotional distress is authentic and compelling.
Therefore, for the jury to award substantial damages, the employee must be ready to prove that the emotional injury manifested into physical changes in behavior or physical illness such as an ulcer.
Certain forms of emotional abuse can cause phobias, including post-traumatic stress syndrome. One way of proving this is to seek psychiatric care for your emotional injuries. This will require the employee to prove that their life was altered in a real and tangible way.
For example, if your employer occasionally screams at you, intimidates you, or makes you work 20 hours a day, this might not be sufficient.
On the other hand, if your employer subjected you to continuous and hostile verbal abuse over a long period of time, this might be enough.
If you bring such a lawsuit, you must also prove that your employer – not something or someone else in your life – caused your emotional abuse.
If your employer’s conduct was not outrageous enough to support an emotional distress suit, you still could likely still file a worker’s compensation claim for on-the-job stress. However, stress claims are challenging to prove, and the available recoverable damages can be extremely limited.
Consulting With An Employment Lawyer
Should you have specific questions or require additional information about your legal rights and obligations, we strongly advise you to consult with a verified online Employment Lawyer about your issues as soon as possible.
