Whistleblower retaliation can occur in any workplace when a whistleblower’s disclosure of inappropriate conduct within the workplace threatens “business as usual.” Many times, whistleblowers feel like they must disclose improper activity because doing so is part of their job. That is what happened to Beth Svec, a detective for the Chicago Police Department.
In 2015, Svec was selected to participate in a pilot program where detectives conducted follow-up investigations in cases where there was an arrest for unlawful possession of guns. The follow-up investigations were a part of Svec’s job when she was assigned to investigate a case in which two officers arrested two men. As part of the investigation, Beth Svec talked with the two officers, who told her a version of the events of the arrest that matched what they had written in their police reports regarding the incident. The remainder of the investigation involved Svec interviewing the two men who got arrested, as well as talking with eyewitnesses and watching video footage.
When Svec conducted those parts of her follow-up investigation, the accounts of the two men, the remarks from the eyewitnesses, and the video footage all told a story that agreed with each other but not with the accounts of the officers or their police reports. Since there was a discrepancy between the two stories, Svec told the officers about it.
The officers immediately told their supervisors about what had happened, and Svec told her supervisors about it as well. There was a disagreement over whether the two men should be charged with felonies. Svec spoke with the state’s attorney’s office, which chose not to charge the men with felonies. The State’s Attorney’s Office contacted the Chicago Police Department’s Bureau of Internal Affairs which started an investigation into the matter. The city’s Independent Police Review Authority is also investigating the case, as is the United States Department of Justice.
After all of that, Svec got informed that she was no longer part of the gun crime case investigation project and that she was getting transferred to another district. Her work schedule even got changed so that she was only working midnight shifts. Beth Svec considers these actions forms of retaliation because she has been stripped of some of her duties, reassigned, and given shifts that are less desirable than the schedule that she was working previously. She has filed a whistleblower protection claim seeking compensation as well as reinstatement to her previous assignment.
Barrett Law PLLC: Providing a Strong Defense for Mississippi Whistleblowers
Whistleblowers like the detective whose case is discussed above can experience retaliation in a variety of ways. Sometimes, retaliation takes the form of in-your-face bullying or harassment. At other times, there may be threats of violence, threats of humiliation, or threats of some other harm. In Beth Svec’s case, the retaliation was more subtle – barring her from participating in a special project, reassigning her to a different district, and changing her work schedule. This is subtler than some of the other forms of retaliation, but it is possible that those things are also retaliatory actions. If you think that you might have experienced retaliation, you might be able to file a claim for damages. To learn more about whistleblower protection claims, call the Mississippi Whistleblower Attorney at Barrett Law PLLC today at 1 (800) 707-9577 for an initial consultation.