09-3596 Ellis v. DHL Express, Inc.

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Employment
WARN Act

In calculating the number of employees terminated when a business closes under the WARN Act, employees who voluntarily accepted severance packages are not included.

“While we recognize the unenviable positions in which DHL’s Chicagoland workers found themselves, we are unpersuaded by these arguments and cannot conclude on the evidence before us that the workers who accepted the union-negotiated severance packages did so involuntarily. The affidavits of former DHL employees that Ellis and Price present paint a wrenching picture of a difficult decision that had to be made quickly. But they do not demonstrate that the workers were given incomplete information, or that DHL somehow strong-armed them into signing the release forms and accepting the severance packages against their will. (Indeed, Ellis and Price expressly disclaim any arguments that DHL harassed workers or created a hostile work environment to induce them to resign.) To the contrary, several affiants testified that their managers declined to discuss the options with them. Cf. Henn, 819 F.2d at 829 (observing that employer’s unwillingness to advise potential early retirees whether to accept an early retirement offer was probably due to a desire to ‘avoid charges of placing undue pressure on the employees’). The severance agreements and the General Waiver and Release were both negotiated by Local 705 with the workers’ interests in mind, and were written unambiguously in plain English. The General Waiver and Release also expressly advised workers to consult an attorney before signing, as did a letter that Local 705 sent to the already-laid-off workers.”
Affirmed.

09-3596 Ellis v. DHL Express, Inc.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Kennelly, J., Tinder, J.

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