Court Rejects ADA Claim of Employee Who Was Discharged for Threatening to Kill Supervisor

A Federal court, in Bodenstab v. County of Cook, upheld judgment entered in favor of a county Hospital which terminated one of its staff physicians after the physician threatened to kill his supervisor and other co-workers. The physician sued the Hospital following his termination claiming that he was terminated because the Hospital regarding him as having a mental impairment that caused him to threaten his co-workers. The Court held that not only did the physician fail to produce evidence that a co-worker who was not regarded as disabled was not terminated for engaging in similar misconduct, but he also failed to produce any evidence tending to prove that the Hospital's reason for terminating him, i.e. for making a serious threat of harm against a co-worker, was false. The Court rejected the physician's argument that his comments did not rise to the level of a serious threat, holding that the question is not whether the threat was made but whether the employer reasonably believed that a threat was made. A copy of the written decision can be read here.

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