Brian Bradley
WC Monitor
11/6/2015
A former Babcock & Wilcox employee is suing the company, along with recent spinoffs BWXT and BWXT Nuclear Operations Group, for at least $1.5 million as a result of lost compensation and benefits and other damages she said resulted from her wrongful termination in 2013, according to a complaint filed Oct. 30 at United States District Court for the Western District of Virginia in Lynchburg, Va. The plaintiff, Faye Brooks, said in the six-page complaint that B&W fired her on Oct. 29, 2013, for violating a work safety rule that she was “specifically trained to avoid where necessary” and that was “routinely ignored” by her counterparts. “In this sense, then, Brooks was routinely asked to ignore safety and, in turn, the law,” the complaint states. Court documents make no mention of the specific safety rule in question. BWXT spokesman Jud Simmons declined to comment on the lawsuit, citing company policy, and Brooks’ attorney, Richard Hawkins, did not respond to requests for comment.
The complaint alleges that Brooks’ termination, said to be in in connection with an event that occurred on Oct. 21, 2013, was planned by B&W for “quite some time,” and that immediately afterward a former colleague was “walking around the facility telling fellow employees that ‘they had been trying to get [Brooks] fired for a long time.’” Brooks insists that B&W fired her after 23 years with the company because it wanted to replace her with a younger, “cheaper” employee, specifically one who got less in welfare and pension benefits. The complaint does not identify Brooks’ former position with the company.
“Soon after Brooks was wrongfully terminated, B&W replaced her with someone with significantly less experience and significantly less entitlement to welfare and pension benefits provided by B&W,” the complaint states. “Separately, B&W wrongfully fired Brooks because, on the one hand, it told her to engage in unlawful conduct and, then, hypocritically, fired her for the very conduct it required her to perform.” Brooks has been unable to find a comparable full-time job, the complaint adds.
Brooks is seeking more than $1 million for loss of salary and benefits she would have been entitled to if not terminated. She is also seeking over $150,000 in compensatory damages for “humiliation, damage to … reputation, mental and emotional distress, occupational losses, and pain and suffering” she claimed to have experienced after the termination. Brooks is additionally seeking in excess of $350,000 in punitive damages against B&W. Exact amounts sought will be determined at trial, according to the complaint.
