Mealey's Coronavirus : Mealey's : Legal News & Analysis

Mealey's Coronavirus

February 05, 2025
Federal Judge Won’t Reconsider Summary Judgment Ruling In Vaccine Mandate Case

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A federal judge in Missouri denied an employer’s request that she reconsider a summary judgment ruling that allows two workers who were fired for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine to proceed with a religious discrimination failure-to-accommodate claim brought under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and a portion of a religious discrimination claim brought under state law, opining that questions of fact remain as to the issue of undue hardship.
February 04, 2025
7th Circuit: Woman Fired Over Vaccine Owes Legal Fees After Arbitration Challenge

CHICAGO — A Seventh Circuit panel affirmed a trial court’s referral to arbitration and dismissal of a complaint by a former employee of a health care software company who alleges that she was illegally terminated for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine and awarded sanctions for the employee’s “uniformly frivolous” objections to arbitration but also noted that the lower court should have stayed the case instead of dismissing it.
February 04, 2025
Damaged Credit Suit Stemming From Alleged Misreport Of COVID Accommodation Settles

RALEIGH, N.C. — A credit reporting agency on Feb. 3 filed a notice of settlement in a North Carolina federal court stating that it and a borrower had reached a settlement of all of the borrower’s claims against the agency, which included allegations of violations of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) after the borrower received an accommodation on an auto loan during the COVID-19 pandemic and expected his account to be reported as current.
February 03, 2025
Transit Employees Who Won $7.8M For COVID-19 Vaccine Refusal Firings Cross-Appeal

SAN FRANCISCO — Former employees of a state transit agency on Jan. 31 filed a notice of cross-appeal to the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals seeking review of a California federal court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of the agency on the employees’ First Amendment free exercise claim, as well as the court’s final pretrial order, after a jury awarded the employees more than $1 million each for the agency’s failure to accommodate their religious objections to being vaccinated for COVID-19.
January 31, 2025
California Transit Agency Seeks Stay Of $7.8M Judgment Against It Pending Appeal

SAN FRANCISCO — A state transit agency on Jan. 30 moved a California federal court for stay of enforcement of judgment pending appeal after seeking review by the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals of the lower court’s decision denying its motion for judgment as a matter of law or, in the alternative, for a new trial in the wake of a California federal jury’s award to six former employees of more than $1 million each for failing to accommodate their religious objections to being vaccinated for COVID-19.
January 30, 2025
Lab Seeking COVID-19 Testing Repayment Adequately Pleads Derivative ERISA Standing

NEWARK, N.J. — Concluding that a medical testing laboratory had obtained derivative standing under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act via assignments of rights by ERISA-governed plan beneficiaries to sue health insurers for reimbursement for COVID-19 testing, a New Jersey federal judge on Jan. 29 denied in part the insurers’ motion to dismiss, while dismissing state law claims and claims based on assignments of rights that were executed after the litigation began.
January 30, 2025
Federal Judge Approves Catholic University’s $2M Pandemic Closure Settlement

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal judge in the District of Columbia issued two orders, one granting final approval of a $2 million class settlement to be paid by The Catholic University of America to end a student’s claims over the school’s closure during the start of the coronavirus pandemic and the second awarding class counsel $666,666.66 in attorney fees and $132,048.14 in costs and the class representative $7,500 for a service award.
January 29, 2025
Panel Reverses Judgment In Baylor College Of Medicine’s Favor In COVID-19 Dispute

HOUSTON — Noting an issue of first impression, a Texas appeals court concluded Jan. 28 that the presence of COVID-19 at the Baylor College of Medicine did not cause “direct physical loss of or damage to” to the insured’s property and reversed a lower court’s judgment following a jury verdict in favor of the insured.
January 29, 2025
Pennsylvania Court Affirms Dismissal Of All Claims In Coronavirus Coverage Suit

HARRISBURG, Pa. — Reconsidering its previous ruling on remand in light of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s decision in Ungarean v. CNA & Valley Forge Ins. Co., a Pennsylvania court affirmed a lower court’s dismissal of all claims brought by an insured in a coronavirus coverage dispute.
January 27, 2025
1st Circuit Revives Religious Discrimination Claims Over COVID-19 Vaccine Firing

BOSTON — A woman who was terminated from her job at a global biopharmaceuticals company for not getting the COVID-19 vaccine stating that it went against her “personal, private and sincerely held religious beliefs” may still have grounds to sue her employer for religious discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the corresponding Massachusetts state law after a panel of the First Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals partially reversed the lower court’s dismissal of her claims.
January 24, 2025
New Jersey State Officials Have Qualified Immunity For Orders Addressing COVID-19

CAMDEN, N.J. — Concluding that that they were entitled to qualified immunity in their handling of the COVID-19 pandemic with respect to nursing homes, a New Jersey federal court granted a motion to dismiss by New Jersey’s governor and public health commissioner in a lawsuit by survivors of former nursing home residents who died from COVID-19.
January 24, 2025
Panel Partly Reverses Ruling In Retirement Facilities’ Coronavirus Coverage Suit

CHICAGO — An Illinois appellate court panel reversed a lower court’s dismissal of insureds’ claim against one insurer in their lawsuit seeking “Contaminated Food/Communicable Disease Coverage,” finding that the application of the policy’s “Pathogenic or Poisonous or Chemical Materials” exclusion “would completely eviscerate that coverage and render it illusory,” but otherwise affirmed the lower court’s ruling in the insureds’ lawsuit prompted by the losses incurred by their continuing care retirement facilities following the COVID-19 outbreak.
January 24, 2025
Federal Court Dismisses Hospital’s Coronavirus Coverage Suit Following Settlement

BOSTON — A Massachusetts federal court dismissed without prejudice a hospital insured’s breach of contract lawsuit seeking coverage for its losses arising from the COVID-19 pandemic after the insured and its commercial property insurer announced that they reached a settlement.
January 23, 2025
1st Circuit Panel Upholds Firing For COVID-19 Refusal, But On Different Grounds

BOSTON — While disagreeing with a Massachusetts federal court as to the basis for its decision, a panel of the First Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed the lower court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of a communications company in a former employee’s lawsuit alleging both disability and religious discrimination in terminating him for his refusal to become vaccinated against COVID-19.
January 21, 2025
Former Employee With Long COVID Alleges Her Firing By UPS Violated ADA, FMLA

PORTLAND, Maine — A former employee of a package delivery company filed suit against her former employer, alleging that her termination after developing “long COVID” was a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and state and federal family and medical leave statutes.
January 21, 2025
SBA Within Statutory Authority To Set Corporate Limits On PPP Loan Disbursements

CHICAGO — Ruling that the Small Business Administration (SBA) was statutorily authorized to create eligibility limits for Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans, an Illinois federal judge granted the SBA’s motion for summary judgment in a lawsuit by a rehabilitation center seeking PPP loan forgiveness and denied the center’s motion for summary judgment and its motion for an interlocutory order compelling reimbursement of loan funds that were recouped by the government.
January 17, 2025
Michigan Jury Awards $133,000 To Employee Fired For Refusing COVID-19 Vaccination

DETROIT — A Michigan federal jury on Jan. 16 awarded $133,000 to a former employee of a resort after determining that his refusal to take the COVID-19 vaccine was based on a sincerely held religious belief and that the resort failed to prove that accommodating the employee’s religious beliefs would have caused it to suffer an undue hardship.
January 16, 2025
Supreme Court Declines To Enjoin State Physician COVID-19 Misinformation Policy

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court has denied an application for injunction pending appeal submitted by Washington state doctors and others to prevent the enforcement of state policy prohibiting the dissemination of COVID-19 vaccine misinformation.
January 16, 2025
2nd Circuit: No Gender Bias By Trader Joe’s For Pandemic Trip Firing

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — A Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel, in affirming a Connecticut federal judge’s order granting summary judgment, has determined that “no reasonable factfinder could conclude on” the record presented that Trader Joe’s termination of a female employee after she took a vacation out of the country during the escalation of the COVID-19 pandemic following a written warning and negative performance review “was a pretext for sex discrimination or that sex discrimination was an otherwise motivating factor” in the decision.
January 15, 2025
Hydroxychloroquine Supplier Denies Its Amended Complaint Prejudices Manufacturer

TRENTON, N.J. — A pharmaceutical supplier on Jan. 14 informed a New Jersey federal court that the striking of its second amended complaint (SAC), filed in connection with its purchase of large quantities of hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine phosphate from a manufacturer, is not warranted, maintaining that the SAC neither adds nor removes counts from the proposed version and simply adds facts in support of the counts it was permitted to amend.
January 15, 2025
4th Circuit Reverses Dismissal Of Fired Worker’s Religious Bias Vaccine Suit

RICHMOND, Va. — A nurse who alleged religious discrimination and failure to provide reasonable accommodation after her employer denied her request for a religious exemption to its COVID-19 vaccination policy sufficiently alleged that her vaccination beliefs were rooted in her religious beliefs, a Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruled, reversing a trial court’s dismissal of the complaint.
January 14, 2025
High Court Declines To Review Denial Of Qualified Immunity In Prison COVID-19 Case

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Jan. 13 denied the petition for writ of certiorari of prison officials seeking review of a Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals decision reversing a Michigan federal court’s dismissal of a prisoner’s civil rights complaint against the officials stemming from their management of the prison in response to COVID-19.
January 13, 2025
Texas Appeals Dismissal Of Case Alleging Pfizer Misled About COVID-19 Vaccine

LUBBOCK, Texas — Texas filed a notice of appeal to the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals after a Texas federal judge granted a motion to dismiss the state’s lawsuit alleging that Pfizer Inc. made false and misleading claims about the COVID-19 vaccine’s efficacy in violation of the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act (DTPA).
January 10, 2025
10th Circuit Accepts Employee’s Late Rehearing Bid In COVID Vaccine Refusal Case

DENVER — The 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals granted a request to accept an untimely petition for rehearing en banc submitted by a former nursing center employee seeking review of a panel judgment affirming the dismissal of her First Amendment free exercise claim stemming from her termination for refusing to be vaccinated for COVID-19 as mandated by a state health board emergency rule.
January 10, 2025
Statute Of Limitations Bars New Jersey University COVID-19 Quarantine Death Lawsuit

NEWARK, N.J. — A New Jersey federal judge dismissed without prejudice a lawsuit brought by the estate and parents of a college sophomore who died while in COVID-19 isolation during the school year after contracting the disease, ruling that the statute of limitations had run on wrongful death and negligence claims and that contract and fraud claims were deficient.