Legal Question in Employment Law in Utah

Do I have any legal ground to sue my ex-employer for unfair treatment and hold their management responsible for discrimination�.I only worked for this company for 15 months, but that was long enough to work myself up to third in seniority. I watched others come and go, 3 months was the average length of employment that most could stand. I never missed a shift and I was never more than 5 minutes late for a shift. I volunteered to work 4 extra shifts on Thanksgiving so that my co-workers wouldn�t have to disrupt their family time to come in for a 2 hour shift. I am a very hard worker and I am an honest person.

Here�s the story�

Three men (refer to as R-man, J-Man and Mitch) and I, all started working at the same c-store within 30 days of each other. Within the first 60 days, a few of R-man's shifts were caught on camera of him snacking but not paying for the product . R-man was called into the office and confronted. He was reminded that what he did was theft and if it happened again that he would be fired. R-man paid for his stuff and then quit voluntarily.

Two weeks later, J-Man was called in to the office and confronted about his illegal activities. J-man was just fired.

During the first few months of my training, I made 2 different mistakes totaling $35.00.... AND when I told the FIRST ASST. of my errors, she told me that I needed to pay for them before I went home and not to forget!!! I paid for both mistakes, both times.... out of my own pocket. I worked there for over a year and always paid for my stuff.

Almost a year has passed and Mitch accidentally makes the very same CC/Fuel mistake that I had made when I had first started with the company. BUT, Mitch's error was around $86.00 in the customer's favor and mine was only $20. Mitch was given the option to make payments because he didn't have any cash on him that day. Three month�s later and Mitch still hasn�t paid so much as a dime towards the $86.00 he owed the company. Another month goes by and the FIRST ASST. told Mitch that the daily cash overages from the registers over the past few month's were enough to cover the $86.00 that he owed the company and that he didn't have to worry about paying it back anymore. Is that embezzlement on her part?

The company states that all money inside the store.. belongs to the company. Ex: If you pick up a few pennies off the floor, don't put them in your pocket, that�s theft. They belong to the company.

I had a customer come in to warn me that she 'had it in for me'. He explained that she was standing behind the counter in front of a store full of customers just carrying on and on about me and telling all sorts of untruths about me�

Which leads to;

I had an energy drink during a 9 hour shift one day. The following day when I arrived at work, I was immediately pulled in to the office and showed video tape of me drinking that energy drink and then tossing the can in to the trash. I remember paying for an energy drink, but I did not print a receipt. I cannot prove that I paid for it. The first time in 15 months, I don�t have any of my receipts to prove my innocence and I get charged with Retail Theft and fired from my job.

But, unlike the three mentioned earlier I was not given the chance to defend myself. I wasn�t given any second chances to do or say anything at all. The policeman was instructed to be there at 3:05, 5 minutes after my shift to cite me.

From what the store manager said to me that day, I know that the FIRST ASST. had been making up lies about me, to her for quite some time. I work complete opposite shifts from these two and that makes it quite difficult for the Manager to get to know who I really am, and extremely easy for her to start believing the lies being fed to her every day from her FIRST ASST.

I know that the special treatment that was showered on the men in my story has nothing to do with the charges against me, but

whether I paid for that drink or not, is no longer the issue. I feel that the company and their managers should have and had been treating all of their employees equally. If one employee is responsible for their mistakes and is held responsible for the monetary value of that mistake, then all employees should be held responsible and payment expected.

If they are going to give one employee a second chance, then all employees deserve a second chance. If the company has a zero tolerance for all mistakes made, then the company needs to press charges against all offenders�. Not just me.

Do I have grounds to sue?

1 Answer from Attorneys

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