Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against Intel Corporation in, Intel Corporation Investment Policy Committee v. Sulyma, a case with potentially far reaching implications to employers who maintain Section 401(k) retirement plans.

The case involved a class action lawsuit brought by an Intel employee who claimed that Intel, Intel committees and individuals administering two Intel retirement plans had breached their fiduciary duties under ERISA, the federal law that governs such plans, by offering two investment funds that were imprudently overinvested in “alternative investments” such as hedge funds and private equity and failed to disclose relevant facts about those allocations to plan participants.  This is but one of many similar class action ERISA lawsuits brought against large employers, universities and colleges.  The Supreme Court decision focused on the time a plaintiff has to bring such a claim.  ERISA Section 413 allows a plaintiff as long as six years to file suit following an alleged ERISA breach or violation.  However, if a plaintiff has “actual knowledge” of a breach or violation, that period is reduced to three years.Continue Reading United States Supreme Court Rules in ERISA Fiduciary Case

Photo: Tomas de Aquino via Flickr (CC by 2.0)

On March 7, 2019 the NH Supreme Court ruled that an employee’s worker’s compensation carrier was wrong to deny reimbursement for the cost of medical marijuana to an employee recovering from a work related injury.  The employee, Andrew Panaggio, suffered a lower back injury in 1991.  He received a lump sum settlement for permanent impairment in 1997 and continued to experience pain as a result of the injury.  He experienced negative side effects from prescribed opioids and was issued a NH cannabis registration card approving him for the use of medical marijuana in 2016.  He purchased the marijuana and then sought reimbursement from the worker’s compensation carrier which denied payment stating that “medical marijuana is not reasonable/necessary or causally related” to the injury.Continue Reading NH Supreme Court Rules That Worker’s Compensation Carrier May be Required to Reimburse for Medical Marijuana

In a long awaited decision reversing 26 years of existing precedent, on June 21st the United States Supreme Court ruled in South Dakota  v. Wayfair, Inc., that states and other taxing jurisdictions could require out of state retailers to collect sales tax on online sales even though the retailers had no physical presence in the taxing jurisdiction.
Continue Reading United States Supreme Court Declares Open Tax Season on On-line Retailers

Photo: Rusty Clark via Flickr (CC by 2.0)
Photo: Rusty Clark via Flickr (CC by 2.0)

Earlier this month, the Supreme Court announced that it had decided not to hear the case of Gavin Grimm – the transgender student who sued his school district seeking access to the restroom and locker room facilities that correspond to his gender identity.  The Court’s  change in course followed the Trump Administration’s rescission of an Obama-era Department of Education policy on the issue of bathroom access.  Although Grimm’s suit involves public school students, private employers have been keeping a close eye on the case for any implications it may have on the rights of transgender employees in the workplace.  The answer to that question will have to wait.
Continue Reading The Problem with Pronouns

Photo: Judge Neil Gorsuch (Public Domain)
Photo: Judge Neil Gorsuch (Public Domain)

Last month, President Trump nominated Judge Neil Gorsuch from the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit to fill the vacant seat left by the late Antonin Scalia on the United States Supreme Court.  While Judge Gorsuch’s nomination has been met with both praise and criticism from a divided electorate, it may bring good news to employers wrestling with leave requests under federal disability laws.
Continue Reading Supreme Court Nominee’s Record on Disability Leave Favorable to Employers

Earlier this week, the New Hampshire Supreme Court issued an opinion holding that the New Hampshire Law Against Discrimination, RSA Chapter 354-A, can impose liability upon individual employees for aiding and abetting discrimination in the workplace, and for retaliation against another employee in the workplace of a qualifying employer.

The issue came before the New

Last month, the United States Supreme Court ruled unanimously in Tibble v. Edison International that retirement plan fiduciaries have an ongoing duty to monitor plan investments.  The ruling came in a case involving challenges to plan investment decisions made more than six years before suit was filed. The lower courts had ruled some claims were