Legal Question in Employment Law in Virginia
My husand was recently fired from his job working with a large home improvement store. They said they let him go because he missed too many days, even though he had doctors notes including his at work heart attack. Before letting him go my father was dying from cancer and they gave us a FML act form to have filled out by my father's VA doctor (my Dad lived 138 miles one way from us). They denied his FML claim because they said it was returned to them 1 week too late. My question is do we have any legal recourse against the company?
1 Answer from Attorneys
If your father is now deceased, the issue would be whether his estate might now have a valid claim against his former employer for denying him the leave
that he had requested under the FMLA. I suspect the answer would be no since FMLA leave is unpaid leave and it would be difficult to prove a legal nexus
(in my opinion) between the denial of the leave and the compensable or
even consequential damages that your dying father allegedly incurred from the denial of this FMLA leave.
You might, however, want to seek the opinion of another attorney on this issue who handles personal injury matters.