Legal Question in Civil Rights Law in Connecticut

Age discrimination in police department

I am a 30 year police veteran. I have

a spotless career, including earning

the medal of merit twice. about 5

months ago i was injured on the job.

to make a long story short, I was not

able to seek immediate medical

attention. because of this, my wife

took the liberty to write a letter to

the police commission. the

department is now saying that I

broke the chain of command by doing

this and that i never reported the

injury. I have not returned to work,

as the injury required surgery and i

cannot work at full capacity and they

refuse to give me a light duty

position. i have lost a significant amount of pay pay because of lost

overtime and face a suspension upon

my ability to return to full duty. I

have been threatened with my job. I

am not the first veteran officer that

has experienced these types of

problems within the department, and

the chief had made it clear that he

wishes to fade out the older officers

for younger people. do I have a case

here? thank you for any time and

consideration.


Asked on 3/23/08, 8:03 am

1 Answer from Attorneys
John Serrano Serrano & Serrano, LLC - Connecticut Accident, Social Security & Divorce Lawyers

Re: Age discrimination in police department

You have one case and maybe two more. (1) You have a workers compensation case for being hurt at work. You only have 1 year to officially file a workers compensation claim. From your question I am not sure you have officially filed a claim. You want to make sure you do not lose your rights by not filing on time.

(2) You may have a case for retaliation if you are being penalized for saying you were hurt at work. I would need more information to say whether this is a case you could pursue. (3) You may also have an age discrimination case. Being discriminated against for age and proving you are being discriminated for age are two different things. From your question, it does not seem obvious that your age is the problem. If you could show that one or more other older officers have gone through the same thing when they were hurt at work, you may have a discrimination case. You probably would have to go through your union first before you could bring a case in court. Again, I would need more information. Call my office Monday morning if you would like to discuss this further. If I am not in, tell my secretary I said to give you my cell phone number.

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Answered on 3/23/08, 11:20 am


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