Legal Question in Employment Law in Texas

Is company EMAIL protected as Free Speech
I have a friend, at our company, who sent a consentual, but sexual in nature, joke to another employee, via the company EMAIL system.
The person who received the joke left the company, leaving the joke in the IN-BASKET. The HR department sent a person to gather up all of the former employee's belongings and determine whether there was any unfinished business, at which time the HR person scanned through the EMAIL box of the former employee.
HR discovered the joke and decided that they were offended and that it violated "company policy' (I don't know which one, though) -- perhaps they constitute it as "sexual harassment"...
Is the content of an EMAIL, sent to another willing party within the company, that is intercepted by the powers-that-be, protected as Free Speech or not.

Asked on 3/07/98, 4:18 pm

Ken Koury Kenneth P. Koury, Esq.

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0 attorneys agreed

Not free speech

Company email sent by an employee is not protected as free speech.

Answered on 3/12/98, 3:40 am

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