Second DUI???
I think NOT!
My two cents.
Yes, DUI is serious. However, there is absolutely no indication made by Katie that the guy is drinking at WORK. And the paralegal had no obligation to tell Katie that he had been arrested for anything.
If the court takes away his driver’s license, which it undoubtedly will, he won’t be endangering anyone because he won’t be driving anymore. The court will probably also require that he go to counseling. He will also spend 2 days in jail. These measures all seem appropriate. Taking away his livelihood does not.
Now, the second his drinking starts affecting his ability to do his JOB, then I’d say she should consider letting him go. But until then, I think she should let the courts mete out the punishment that is appropriate and keep her nose out of what he does in his personal time.
If he were to get onto a drunk driving accident and lose the use of his legs, would that make him a paraplegal?
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- It’s fairly simple to me, especially when you look at it from another perspective: why would you want to pay him for being in jail for two days?
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- It’s fairly simple to me, especially when you look at it from another perspective: why would you want to pay him for being in jail for two days?
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If the court takes away his driver’s license, which it undoubtedly will, he won’t be endangering anyone because he won’t be driving anymore.
Yes. Because we know that drunk drivers are a law-abiding bunch, right?
If he loses his license, there goes his ability to do his job, unless he can walk to the places he needs to go or there’s mass transportation available.
As someone who’s Labor, not Management…
This paralegal’s moral development isn’t your purview; you’re not his parent. His legal punishment isn’t yours to dole out either; the court has assumed that responsibility.
Arranging ahead of time to use his vacation time to cover the two days in jail is much preferable to him just not showing up for two days (which is what my ex-boss did when he was arrested for DUI 12 years ago).
You have some valid concerns; dog-piling onto this guy won’t address any of them.
I agree that you should put a formal leave-time policy in place.
In the meantime, I think you are justified in deciding when you give paid time off and the reasons for that time off are a valid consideration.
If I were to ask my boss for 2 days off to go hiking during a particularly busy time, she’d likely say no. The burden on my coworkers would be too great. However, if I needed the time off to go to a family members funeral, she’d probably say yes. In that situation it wouldn’t be unreasonable to ask my coworkers to cover for me–as I would do for them in similar circumstances.
Being away from the office means someone else has to do your work or it doesn’t get done. For well deserved time off (scheduled in advance with everything as taken care of ahead of time as it can) or emergencies, coworkers are expected to help out. But I’d be a bit peeved if I had to cover for a coworker who was getting paid time to sit in jail.
I disagree, MaddyStrut, that it’s the right of a typical business to know why an employee is taking leave if it isn’t for sickness, family funeral, or “vacation.” It’s not their business to punish for jail time unless there is a specific policy in place regarding employee integrity (or whatever you want to call it). I think that a law office should have such a policy, but that’s just me.
And I don’t think the OP is being a bitch, I think she’s being had. This paralegal is obviously a charmer or you wouldn’t stick your neck out for him, and by this point it would be obvious to me that he’s not worth it. You’re probably enabling him to continue drinking because he knows you’ll shake hands with the judge and make it better and he’ll be paid for his jail time besides.
Check with your malpractice insurance, as you suggested you would do, and cut this guy loose if they even suggest it to you. Your personal appearance at his hearing/trial/sentencing to smooth his way back into freedom may seem like a friendly thing to do but you can count on it being portrayed in the uglist possible light if this paralegal ever gets into serious trouble later on. Any newspaper or radio talk jock would have a field day with the Lawyer Who Lets Her Paralegals DWI. If the paralegal hurts someone, or crashes his car into the statue of Jebediah Springfield in the town square, or God forbid he kills a girl playing on the side of the road, they won’t blame him, they’ll come after you because they’ll say you knew it could happen.
Maybe having no paid leave policy has worked brilliantly in the past, and fostered a friendly, no-pressure atmosphere at work, but it sounds like you’re being played. It’s time to write it down and keep track of it, whether it’s you tracking it or whether you delegate that to your bookkeeper or if you buy a commercial program for the purpose.
Just my two… things. Cents. Whatever.
FISH
As a lawyer and an HR professional (though now, um, retired) I can’t agree more emphatically with those who say write a formal PTO/UTO policy and put it in place now, without delay.
As for DUI paralegal, start w/your malpractice insurance. If they will continue to cover you without regard to his DUI (which is very likely, given the number of lawyers I know who continue to practice after DUIs) then you’ll need to make decisions based upon his relative value to your practice.
Give him unpaid time off for the days he’ll be in jail. It’s not a vacation, a family emergency or sick time, so it shouldn’t be treated the same way that those would be. if you have work that he needs to do, then give him the opportunity to come in on a weekend or evenings to make the time up to you, and pay him, but do that only if it is to your benefit, not his.
If the court doesn’t sentence him to anything more than AA meetings, sit down and talk to him about professional, one-on-one substance abuse counseling. Some kind of program is likely to be covered through your insurance plan. Tell him that you consider his future at your firm will benefit from a commitment to dealing with his demonstrated alcohol issues in a positive fashion.
If he chafes at these decisions, it’s time to let him go. Make that clear.
But remember that you’re not his mother, not the judge and your only interest in intervening in this situation is the continued successful management of your practice. Anything that steps beyond that interest is outside of the necessary boundaries between employer and employee.
I guess the difference is that I don’t see it as punishment to not pay an employee for time that they’re not at the office.
I look at it similar to my situation where I have a certain number of sick days, vacation days which have to be scheduled 2 weeks in advance and even then are at my manager’s discretion (e.g. I can’t schedule them during the busiest time of the year), and personal days for situations that don’t call for a sick day but are emergencies where I can’t give 2 weeks notice.
Typical reasons for personal days have included funerals, sick family members, pet trouble, car trouble, home trouble (flooded basements were a big problem this summer), etc. I know when I call in for a personal day there’s always a chance my manager may say “sorry, you have to come in.” That hasn’t happened to me, but I know one co-worker had to come in when she wanted to take a personal day to get a bad hair coloring fixed–her boss felt that burdening us with extra work just because she couldn’t wait till the weekend wasn’t a good idea. (Granted, that’s an extreme example.)
I can see your point that having an employer decide that my need for time off may not be as important as someone else’s can get problematic. For example, an employer may decide my request to take a sick dog to the vet may not be valid where someone else who requests time because a sitter doesn’t show is. I’d be a bit ticked. If my employer said “you can take your dog to the vet, but you won’t be paid for that time unless you make it up on the weekend,” I may still feel it was a bit unfair–but it wouldn’t upset me too greatly.
I guess I’m just used to my employer knowing the reasons why I’m requesting time off outside of my normal vacation requests and either granting that request or not depending on the circumstances. So I never really thought about whether it was right or wrong–I’m just used to it.
As a result, I don’t find it unreasonable to say “you can take the time off while you’re in jail, but you either work the weekend or you don’t get paid for those two days.”
Georgia is a right to work state. This Orwellian phrase means the guy can be fired for any reason, or for no reason at all. He can be fired for lookng at her funny, or for not looking at her funny enough. I consider this a sick state of affairs, but there’s no denying that it’s the case.
So the question is not about the legality of firing him, it’s about the morality, an issue I am glad to see a lawyer taking seriously for once.
What the guy does on his own time is not your business. Repeat. Is. Not. Your. Business.
And you dont’ want it to be. Now, if his drinking screws up his job performance, then you can fire him for it, because it’s not his own time. I’m not sure what you should do if his duties include driving during work hours – you have a reasonable fear that he might drink while driving on an errand for you, but no evidence that he has ever done so.
Also, think about what you’ll do when he gets his third DUI, because he certainly seems to be headed toward a third one. DUI laws in Georgia are scary, so scary that a number of state legislators recently got dragged into a scandal involving gettting folks off the hook for multiple DUI convictions in exchange for large sums of money.
BTW, my wife has been working full time for two years for an employer and gets no sick leave and the only vacation time she gets is five days during Christmas. Apparently, Georgia has no laws about this either. If she doesnt’ work, she doesn’t get paid. Another reason this fucking state stinks on ice.
BTW, my wife has been working full time for two years for an employer and gets no sick leave and the only vacation time she gets is five days during Christmas. Apparently, Georgia has no laws about this either. If she doesnt’ work, she doesn’t get paid.
Umm … isn’t this the norm if you’re an hourly worker? I’ve never had a job that gave me a paid vacation or allowed me X number of days to be sick. I’ve had understanding bosses, but being sick always netted me a smaller paycheck.
How is it different elsewhere?
In some storied climes, halcyon lands of enlightenment that they are, full-time employees get X number of hours credit for hours worked which can be used for sick leave, personal leave or whatever. this applies to both hourly and salaried workers, though the rates may differ between the two.
It makes for a much more civilized relationship between employers and employees, so of course must by rabidly opposed by conservatives everywhere.
Where I work, I have X-number of hours of vacation days/year, X-number of sick days and X-number of “personal” days. If I want a personal day, the relevant question isn’t “Why do you want it?” The relevant question is “How many personal hours do you have left?” It’s my responsibility to pace these days, but if I choose to blow them all on January, it’s my own damn business.
Hair coloring is a perfectly valid reason for a personal day, IMHO.
This is a law office? This man has committed a crime at least twice. (We will never know how many times he has not been caught.) If my attorney employed someone who had two DUI’s, I would find another attorney – one that took the laws more seriously.
You sound like a really decent person but you are going overboard in your efforts to be helpful to someone who needs to face the consequences of his actions. You said that the judge is known for not allowing people to serve on weekends. There is a reason for that. The judge wants DUI perps to have to be inconvenienced so that they will think twice before doing it again.
If you allow him to make up the work on the weekend, you have taken the bite out of the judge’s no weekend rule.
BTW, if he injured someone while under the influence while running an errand for your office, would you be liable?
Krokodil the reason that “why” is asked for personal days at my company is because they’re used when you can’t give adequate notice that you’ll be away and can’t be flexible about the dates.
I have a big meeting with our media group tomorrow. If I were to call in, we’d have to reschedule a lot of calendars, and having our update later than tomorrow would put the media group even further behind on some tight deadlines. My calling in would place a burden on my coworkers. Sure, sometimes it’s neccessary and we help each other out. But the understanding is that you only take these days when it’s important and you really have no choice.
I realize this isn’t the situation with the OP (I assume you’d have notice of upcoming jail time). I was just making the point that knowing, and caring, about the reason for time off isn’t unheard of. So I can see an employer saying “we won’t fire you for taking those days off, but you have to make them up or not be paid for them.”
Sometimes, I wish I could just call in and say “personal day” rather than giving a reason. It would have spared me having to explain to my boss that I was rushing my dog to the vet because he was passing a tube sock–only to come in the next day to find those jokers had covered my office in tube socks! Actually, that was pretty funny. But it was over a month ago and I’m still occassionally pulling tube socks out of old files!
How in heaven’s name would you know that your attorney employed someone who had a DUI? Unless you routinely query prospective professionals if any of their employees have been convicted of multiple DUIs (which may very well be an invasion of that employee’s privacy, BTW.) And is it just the legal implications of DUI that concerns you or are you equally concerned about an employee who routinely breaks the law but has never been convicted? For instance, what if your doctor or attorney KNEW that his secretary smoked dope every night? Would you pick a new doctor based on that?
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I work part-time and I get paid holidays, personal time and vacation. When I take time off, I write to my manager, “I am taking two vacation days on September 15th and 16th.” She writes back an acknowledgment approving it and it is duly subtracted from my vacation accrual. No question is ever asked about why I need the time off. It would be considered ill mannered and outside their scope of responsibility.
Thanks to everyone who responded, and I do mean everyone. You’ve all given me a lot to think about. My malpractice insurer doesn’t have a problem with me keeping this guy employed, as DUI is not considered to be a “crime of moral tupritude”, i.e., immoral in and of itself (despite the fact that an argument could be made that DU is immoral). A crime of moral tupritude would be stealing, forgery, etc. Also, the DUI happened on a weekend when he was not working or doing anything related to work. Obviously, if it happened on my time, we’d be in a different situation.
As it turns out, he is going to court today instead of Wed. The judge had a last minute scheduling change, so I won't be able to go, which is OK, as I was having serious second thoughts about that. His lawyer called me this monring and said that he'd gotten the prosecutor to come down to 24 hours in jail, and he thinks that he might be able to get the judge to let him do it on the weekend. If not, I had a little chat with him this morning, and he is willing and more than happy to make up the day he'll miss.
A couple of people were wondering about why a paralegal needs a license to drive. I guess there would be cases where they woudn't, but we definitely need our paralegal to be able to get around. He lives 30 minutes away, there's no public transportation here, and part of his duties include serving subpoenas, seeing inmates that are housed in other couties, etc.
And, I am in the process of drafting a written leave policy, which will include jail time not being paid, how much notice I need to have, etc.
Thanks to everyone who posted for your input. **Evil Captor,** I hope I've improved your opinion about lawyers a little!Coming from my perspective only, I’ve worked for years as a salaried employee. I’ve work around the clock many times in order to meet objectives, and taken much regular time off in order to meet my personal objectives. As someone who wanted always to be valued, I always gave more than I took.
If I was your DUI employee and aware of the extra effort that I gave to the firm, I would resent the docking of wages. Dammit, a couple of days is easy to make up for. I would immediately begin the search to look for alternative employment.
IMHO you just have to decide “do I want to keep this guy or not”. Is he going to make it right for the firm or not. If you want to make a statement about your attitude towards DUI’s then go ahead, but now we 'll where your priorities lie.
Of course if your employee is a slug, go ahead. That’s what I would do.