On August 10, 2005 the United States Department of Justice ("D.O.J.") filed a lawsuit under Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Act of 1994, 38 U.S.C. §§ 4301-4333 ("USERRA"), in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana against the Indiana Department of Correction. The D.O.J asked the court for injunctive and compensatory relief, alleging that the defendant had violated USERRA by denying benefits and compensation to a corrections officer who took leave to undergo active duty military training as an army reserve.

Specifically, the complaint alleges that the Indiana Department of Correction violated USERRA by: (1) denying the individual corrections officer, after the completion of his active duty, reemployment rights and benefits and other employment benefits protected under USERRA by -- (a) suspending him from employment, and (b) terminating him from employment with loss of pay and loss of seniority and related benefits; (2) failing or refusing to take appropriate action to remedy the effects of the violations above including failure and refusal to provide compensation for the period of work in which he was terminated, and failure to restore seniority and related benefits he lost due to termination.

The parties filed a consent decree concurrently with the complaint; the District Court (Judge John Daniel Tinder) entered the decree. The consent decree provides that the defendant: (1) shall not take any action against any person which constitutes retaliation or interference with the exercise of such person's rights under USERRA, or because such person gave testimony or assistance or participated in any manner of proceeding or investigation connected with this case; (2) shall compensate the individual corrections officer for the lost wages, seniority, and related benefits that occurred as a result of not being employed continuously by the Indiana DOC from August 2003 to December 2, 2003. A minor modification of the decree was filed a couple of weeks later.

This case was closed on September 28, 2005.

James Floyd - 11/01/2007


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