A federal judge in Tennessee refused to throw out a lawsuit by a former employee for the Department of Energy’s environmental cleanup contractor at the Oak Ridge Site who was fired after refusing to be vaccinated against COVID-19.
Plaintiff Yolonda Riggs, a former lead radiation technician for United Cleanup Oak Ridge (UCOR), was fired by the contractor on Jan. 10, 2022. This came “upon her failure to comply with the company’s vaccine mandate and provide proof of vaccination,” U.S. District Court Judge Charles Atchley said in a 12-page order dated Nov. 21.
“The court holds that neither derivative sovereign immunity nor the government contractor defense provides grounds to dismiss plaintiff’s amended complaint,” the judge held in U.S. District Court for Eastern Tennessee. “The court also holds that the plaintiff has alleged sufficient facts to state a claim for violation of Tennessee’s COVID-19 statute.”
As a result, the judge denied UCOR’s motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim. The UCOR team consists of Amentum and Jacobs, which recently announced their intention to merge government contracting operations, along with Honeywell.
According to the judge’s decision, Riggs received a Dec. 29, 2021, letter from UCOR saying unless she started the vaccination process by Jan. 10, 2022, she would be fired.
Both the “contractor mandate” defense and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s emergency temporary standard cited by UCOR “have been deemed likely to be invalid,” the judge held.
Barring settlement or delay, the case is on track for an April 9, 2024, jury trial in Chattanooga, Tenn., according to online court documents.
Riggs filed the lawsuit in April 2022 in Tennessee state court in Roane County.
