O'Rourke v. Dept. of Labor

Syllabus

The plaintiff, a former employee of the defendant Department of Children and Families (department), appealed to this court from the judgment of the trial court dismissing her administrative appeal from the decision of the defendant Department of Labor, State Board of Labor Relations, concluding that she had failed to establish that the defendant union had breached its duty of fair representation during arbitration proceedings with the department regarding whether the department had just cause to terminate the plaintiff's employment. In her position with the depart- ment, the plaintiff investigated allegations of child abuse and neglect. After completing an investigation of a particular case involving a moth- er's alleged neglect of her two children, the plaintiff submitted to her supervisor, F, a draft investigative report, which concluded that, with respect to one of the children, the allegation was not substantiated. F disagreed with various parts of the draft report and made various changes in the final draft of that report to address her concerns. On the basis of the information included in the final report, the department filed an application for an ex parte order of temporary custody. The plaintiff, believing that the final report contained false and misleading information and omitted certain exculpatory information, and without notifying or obtaining permission from the department, sent a copy of the draft report to the attorney who represented the mother in the order of temporary custody proceedings. Thereafter, a human resources specialist for the department initiated an investigation of the plaintiff relating to her disclosure of the confidential, draft report. He determined that she had violated various department policies, a state statute ((Supp. 2010) § 17a-28), and a state regulation (§ 5-240-1a (c)), and the depart- ment terminated her employment. The union filed a grievance on behalf of the plaintiff, claiming that the department had terminated her e