Lambert v. United Parcel Service

Blaine Lambert worked for United Parcel Service as an ESC Clerk in its Sarasota, Florida facility. In 2008 Mr. Lambert decided to join the U.S. Army. He told his UPS supervisor of his desire to serve, left work, and began his tour of duty. Near the end of his tour of duty Mr. Lambert’s supervisor wrote Mr. Lambert a letter informing him that he would have a job upon his return from military duty. Midway through his tour of duty Mr. Lambert got injured which, in turn, resulted in his medical discharge from the Army. Upon Mr. Lambert’s honorable discharge from active duty he repeatedly requested that UPS re-employ him. Instead of re-employing him, UPS made Mr. Lambert (at Mr. Lambert’s own expense) seek medical clearance to return to work – – – an act that courts have deemed a violation of the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA).   Since Mr. Lambert could not get his job back at UPS he found another job in another part of the state. When Mr. Lambert retained counsel to attempt to facilitate his return to work UPS wrote him a letter accusing him of being on unauthorized leave, threatened him with termination, and demanded that he abandon his current job (which was in another part of the state) and report to UPS within 48 hours.

Having exhausted his options, Mr. Lambert filed suit against UPS. A copy of Mr. Lambert’s legal complaint is available here.

UPS tried to have the court dismiss Mr. Lambert’s USERRA retaliation claim. On July 22, 2017, the court denied UPS’s motion. A copy of the Court’s order is available here.

Subsequently the parties agreed to resolve the case. Part of that resolution required UPS to give Mr. Lambert his job back and pay Mr. Lambert certain compensation by January 19, 2018. UPS did not pay Mr. Lambert by January 19, 2018, which, in turn, caused Mr. Lambert to seek court intervention to enforce the settlement agreement. A copy of Mr. Lambert’s motion is available here.  The court granted Mr. Lambert’s motion and ordered UPS to pay Mr. Lambert legal fees associated with bringing the motion as well as post-judgment interest. A copy of the Court’s order is available here.