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Good news for Army Reserve Capt. Le Roy Torres, and all under the protections of the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA). In Torres v. Texas Department of Public Safety, SCOTUS held 5-4 that Congress\u2019s war powers allow it to subject non-consenting states to money damages lawsuits under the USERRA.<\/p>\n
While deployed in Iraq, Le Roy Torres was exposed to toxic burn pits which caused him to have health problems and no longer be able to work in his old job as a state trooper. He asked his former employer, Texas Department of Public Safety, to employ him in a different role. This request was refused.<\/p>\n
Military.com | By Patricia Kime<\/strong><\/p>\n The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 Wednesday in favor of a former Texas trooper and Army Reserve captain who lost his job over a military-related illness and sued the state for violating the law that protects the jobs of part-time service members.<\/p>\n Justice Stephen Breyer, writing for the majority, said that states do not have immunity from private lawsuits by veterans under the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act, or USERRA.<\/p>\n As part of the case, Texas had argued that states, just like the federal government, are protected by “sovereign immunity” and can’t be privately sued without their consent.<\/p>\n But Breyer said that allowing states to have such immunity would permit them “to thwart national military readiness.”<\/p>\n “Upon entering the Union, the States implicitly agreed that their sovereignty would yield to federal policy to build and keep a national military,” Breyer wrote. “States thus gave up their immunity from congressionally authorized suits pursuant to the ‘plan of the Convention,’ as part of ‘the structure of the original Constitution itself.'”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Interesting breakdown among the judges, but the right decision was made.<\/p>\n Military.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"