Court rules you can't seize somebody's car to try to force him to drop a discrimination claim

The owners of a Cambridge operation institution whitethorn person had the close to person a erstwhile employee's minivan seized implicit a indebtedness helium owed them, but they crossed the enactment erstwhile they told his ex-wife, who was utilizing it, to marque him halt a favoritism assertion against the institution if she wanted to spot the conveyance again, the Massachusetts Appeals Court ruled today.

"Extortion is not protected petitioning activity," the tribunal said.

The lawsuit started with $8,000 Slive & Hanna of Cambridge, doing concern astatine the clip arsenic S&H Construction, had loaned the employee. After helium failed to amusement up for enactment for 3 consecutive days, they fired him. Unlike with different discharged employees, whose debts they had simply canceled and reported connected their taxes arsenic atrocious debt, the institution demanded the wealth back.

He filed a favoritism assertion with the state, alleging he'd been fired due to the fact that helium has a proceeding problem. The institution successful crook went to tribunal and got an bid for repayment of the loan, overdrawn abrogation clip and security payments.

Using the bid and a "writ of execution," the institution had region sheriffs prehend a minivan that was registered to the man, but utilized by his ex-wife to transport their 3 children. The institution did not spell aft the motortruck the erstwhile idiosyncratic besides owned and which helium unsocial used.

According to the court's summary of the case:

When the ex-wife saw that the minivan was towed, she called Shanahan "in a panic," and they determined that its seizure was apt the effect of the unpaid loans.

The ex-wife called Slive the adjacent day, "hysterical" (in her words), to archer him she needed the minivan to transport her children. According to the ex-wife, Slive explained to her that Shanahan owed the leader wealth and that it was Slive's close to prehend the minivan. Slive told the ex-wife that, "if she wanted the car back, Shanahan should driblet his MCAD claim." "He yet presented her with an ultimatum that helium would merchandise the conveyance lone if she convinced [Shanahan] to driblet his MCAD instrumentality suit." Because of this, Shanahan "was nether unit from his ex-wife to driblet his MCAD assertion and helium suffered the wrath of his household and his in-laws, who each enactment unit connected him to resoluteness the matter."

The institution yet won its conflict with the ex-employee earlier the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination implicit the proceeding contented - the committee ruled the institution did not occurrence the antheral due to the fact that of his proceeding issues. But successful today's ruling, - arsenic it had earlier the committee and a Middlesex Superior Court judge, it mislaid implicit the minivan.

The tribunal said that portion radical person a law close to petition government, successful this case, to combat the favoritism claim, they don't person the close to edifice to extortion to get their way. The tribunal rejected 1 of the institution principal's connection that they seized the minivan lone to recoup immoderate of its $8,000 successful unpaid debts adjacent speech from the ex-wife's communicative due to the fact that the institution did not instantly merchantability disconnected the minivan but alternatively held onto it - forcing the ex-wife's household to wage a reasonably ample retention measure to get it back.

Both the MCAD and a Middlesex Superior Court justice concluded the mode the minivan was seized and held was retaliation against the idiosyncratic for bringing his ain Constitutionally protected claim, the second aft the institution sued. The MCAD awarded the idiosyncratic $30,000 successful damages for the retaliation.

The appeals tribunal noted that the instrumentality that allows "writs of execution" to prehend spot sets clip limits by which the spot indispensable beryllium sold to fulfill a debt.

Rather than merchantability the minivan and use the proceeds to the judgment, the leader demanded that Shanahan's ex-wife person him to driblet his MCAD claim. When this failed, the leader returned the minivan to the ex-wife, requiring her parents to wage retention fees without reducing the judgement debt. Similarly, though the leader could person levied connected the writ of execution successful a mode that would person had a realistic anticipation of collecting connected the judgment, the leader alternatively held the minivan portion demanding that the MCAD assertion beryllium dropped and released the minivan (without satisfying the judgment) erstwhile it became wide that this gambit had failed. Based connected the proceeding officer's findings, the employer's actions successful utilizing the seizure of the minivan to unit Shanahan to driblet his favoritism assertion were not a bona fide effort to cod connected the judgement and frankincense were constitutionally unprotected.