United States Ninth Circuit

In a case involving a union's grievance on behalf of certain workers fired based on SSN mismatches that raised concerns about suspected immigration violations, a district court decision vacating an award in favor of the union and workers on the ground that it violated public policy is reversed and the award confirmed where: 1) the employer did not establish constructive knowledge of any immigration violations; 2) constructive knowledge is to be narrowly construed in the immigration context and requires positive information of a worker's undocumented status; and 3) given the extremely short time that employer gave its employees to correct the mismatches at issue, and an arbitrator's finding that employer had no "convincing information" of immigration violations, employees' failure to meet the deadline simply was not probative enough of their immigration status to indicate that public policy would be violated if they were reinstated and given back pay.

Appellate Information

• Argued 04/10/2008
• Decided 06/16/2008
• Published 06/16/2008

Judges

• HALL, Circuit Judge:, Before:  CYNTHIA HOLCOMB HALL, THOMAS G. NELSON, and BARRY G. SILVERMAN, Circuit Judges.

Court

• United States Ninth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Monica Guizar, National Immigration Law Center, Los Angeles, CA, for the amicus curiae.


• For Appellees:
  
• Steven R. Wall and Robert Jon Hendricks, Morgan, Lewis & Brockius, Philadelphia, PA, and Los Angeles, CA, for the plaintiff-counter-defendant-appellee., Manjari Chawla, David A. Rosenfeld and Antonio Ruiz, Weinberg, Roger & Rosenfeld, Alameda, CA, for the defendant-counter-claimant-appellant.