A Tennessee jury has awarded a former research scientist at BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee $687,000 in back pay and damages after she was fired in 2021 for refusing to take the COVID-19 vaccine.
Following a three-day jury trial in Chattanooga last week, a federal jury decided BlueCross failed to provide reasonable accommodation for Tanja Benton, who did most of her work from home and claimed a religious exemption to the company’s vaccine mandate.
Chattanooga Attorney Doug S. Hamill, who represents Benton, said the biostatistical research scientist was fired in November 2021 in violation of her religious beliefs after working for the Chattanooga-based health insurer for nearly six and a half years. Benton said she believed the COVID-19 vaccines are derived from aborted fetus cell lines.
“Because of her sincerely held religious beliefs concerning abortion, (Benton) cannot in good conscience consume the vaccine, which would not only defile her body but also anger and dishonor God,” Hamill said in his lawsuit against BlueCross.
Hamill said Benton’s job rarely involved direct interaction with clients, with only 1% of her total annual working hours involving client interaction. In the lawsuit, Hamill said Benton “never performed any work or attended any meetings in medical facilities where patients were being treated” and “physical in-person interaction with co-workers was never a job requirement
Benton is the first BlueCross employee fired over the vaccine mandate to win an award from the company. Others fired from the company are also suing BlueCross, including several who have joined a class action lawsuit against BlueCross after initially filing complaints with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
In late 2021, BlueCross began mandating its employees be vaccinated for the virus unless they had a religious objection or health reason not to receive the vaccine. Despite objections by Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee and others, the insurer said as a federal contractor it had to comply with a White House directive to require all of its employees to receive a vaccination by Dec. 8, 2021
In September 2021, President Joe Biden issued an executive order requiring federal contractors and subcontractors to comply with workplace safety guidelines developed by a federal task force. That task force subsequently issued guidelines that new, renewed or extended contracts include a clause requiring employees to be fully vaccinated by Jan. 18, 2022.
But before the vaccine mandate for most federal contractors became effective, a federal judge struck down the White House directive.
Former Tennessee Attorney General Herbert Slatery III was among a group of state attorneys general who sued to block the vaccine requirement for federal contractors, calling Biden’s vaccine mandate “unlawful and unconstitutional.”
In October 2021, during a politically charged special session of the Tennessee General Assembly to address the COVID-19 outbreak, state Rep. John Ragan read aloud an email from BlueCross employee Heather Smith opposing her employer’s vaccine mandate. Smith claimed her religious objections to the vaccine were being ignored and Smith was seeking “legislative protection for … individual liberties and rights relating to vaccine mandates.”
Smith was fired less than a week after putting her complaints in writing to lawmakers. She sued, but her termination lawsuit was dismissed by a Hamilton County judge. She appealed, and the Tennessee Court of Appeals ruled in Smith’s favor, establishing — for the first time — that the right of Tennessee employees to petition lawmakers supersedes Tennessee’s at-will employment doctrine, which gives companies the power to fire any employee for nearly any reason.
Obey
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