Illinois: Where Trier of Fact Believes Employer’s Non-Pretextual Reason for Discharge, Employee Fails to Carry His or Her Burden of Proof

The Supreme Court of Illinois held that in a retaliatory discharge action, the burden of proof is on the discharged employee to show that the employment was terminated and that the termination was in retaliation for the employee’s actions, that if an employer provides a reason for the employee’s dismissal, that does not automatically defeat a retaliatory discharge claim, but if the employer chooses to come forward with a valid, non-pretextual basis for discharging its employees and the trier of fact believes it, the causation element required to be proven is not met.

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is a leading commentator and expert on the law of workers’ compensation.

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance. Bracketed citations link to lexis.com.

See Michael v. Precision Alliance Group, LLC, 2014 Ill. LEXIS 1551 (Dec. 4, 2014) [2014 Ill. LEXIS 1551 (Dec. 4, 2014)]

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 104.07 [104.07]

Source: Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law.