Wal-Mart Fires Security Guard for Catching Thief
Since we are talking about dismissal for cause in my employment law course this week, I’d thought I’d note an American incident involving that bastion of progressive employment practices, Wal-Mart.
Security guard Josh Rutner saw a man walk out of the store with a box of golf balls and told him to stop, but the thief ran away. Rutner and another guard then chased down the thief in the parking lot and were surprised when the thief brandished a knife and swiped at them. The two guards were nevertheless able to take down the man and hold him until police arrived. The thief was arrested. The next day, Rutner was fired by Wal-Mart for breaching a ‘no chase’ policy. And if being dismissed for catching a thief is not bad enough, Wal-Mart went further and told Rutner he could never be hired by Wal-Mart again because his offense was unforgivable.
This is an American case, where generally employers can dismiss employees at any time, with no notice and with no reason under the ‘at will’ model of employment. Could a Canadian Wal-Mart store dismiss a security guard for ’cause’ (without notice) for chasing a thief into the parking lot in violation of a company policy? Maybe, if the policy was a term of his employment contract that the employee was made aware of, and the company consistently enforced the policy as a ‘zero tolerance’ offense. In Canada, the question would be whether the employee’s breach of the contract ws sufficiently serious to warrant the employee forfeiting their entitlement to notice of the termination–in other words, did the employer have ’cause’ to summarily dismiss the employee?
Sometimes, Canadian judges have refused to find cause when an employee breaches a company rule, particularly if the rule was not made clear to the employee and there is some ambiguity in how it has been enforced. In addition, if the employee can put forward a ‘reasonable excuse’ for the conduct, judges have sometimes sided with the employee, found no cause, and ordered reasonable notice damages be paid.
In the Wal-Mart case, the security guard said (to reporters and the employer, I assume), that everything happened fast and once the guy pulled a knife, he felt that he posed a risk to the public that he should try to address. Do you think that should be considered a reasonable excuse for breaching a no chase rule?
Nice to know, by the way, that if I steal from Wal-Mart, that no one will be chasing me …
Simon Yaritza
November 10, 2009 at 1:56 am
This is something strange happened to that security guard. I don’t think it’s right to punish him for his duty.
Maurice Perron
October 6, 2010 at 12:51 am
When the security guard was ASSAULTED by the thief brandishing a knife he had the legal right to tell the man he was under arrest and to enforce the duties a common law officer would fulfill. At that point the Walmart employee rules did not apply ,the Criminal Code did.
As far as I see it as soon as the employee left the store doors he was no longer answerable to the employee standards.
Many times you will hear of people being raped and assaulted on Walmart parking lots and the company manages never to get involved with those matters. It’s hypocritical of Walmart to play the role of judge and jury when it can’t manage any security issue when they know of felons and dangerous predators walking their aisles within their stores. Children get abducted from washrooms and women are followed home by stalkers, whom we all know,go to shopping centres to find easy prey because security guards are not allowed to leave the stores. Hey Wally World, when are you going to grow up and stop using security guards as decorations and halt this ridiculous false sense of security.
Mike s
June 28, 2011 at 2:58 pm
Security gaurd was doing his job the best as possible. He should be back on job. Punish the thief and Walmart should be fined big time so that these employers will never play with the employee career in future.
Tom
April 15, 2012 at 2:28 pm
Security Guard was stupid to attend dangerous situation. To stupid maurice, Labour law will not allow guard to attend dangerous situation, so do not try to pull out your “knowledge” of criminal code. Walmart was right to fire that idiot, going against armed criminal. If he was hurt you would be critical izing Walmart for axpecting guard to get involved. We saw in past two years guard getting stabbed in Sellers. First one she may havelost kidney, no more updates. Second guard was stabbed in neck. All that for stolen baby food. Walmart was hundred percent correct.