Legal and Ethical Issues under Consideration - Essay Example

Legal Issues

Introduction

In the given scenario, there are a number of legal and ethical issues that arise, some related to each other while others stand on their own. First to be reviewed in this essay shall be the legal issues contained therein after which the ethical issues shall be considered.

Legal Issues in the Scenario

In the case of Doolittle and Home Décor, several legal issues present themselves. For one, the issue of termination of employment comes to mind. In the scenario, the company, Home Décor was right to terminate the employment of Doolittle as he had, on a number of occasions, contravened the provisions of the company policy and as such, in line with those provisions, was subjected to disciplinary action which resulted in the termination. The company was well within its right, going by the doctrine of employment at will as outlined by Sprague (2011, p. 13). This doctrine also gives the company, Home Décor, the leeway to stipulate the working conditions, for all of its employees including Doolittle, such as those that prohibit the use of official company property for non-business purposes and therefore the need to monitor employee use of such property. Regarding this issue therefore, the dismissal of Doolittle was rightful and warranted.

Another couple of legal issues arise in the events that transpired after Doolittle’s stopover at Burger and Brew on his way home, following his dismissal from Home Décor. The issue regards two main issues, the first being the right to avoid incrimination of one’s self as guaranteed by the fifth amendment of the US Constitution (Harper, 2007). This arose in the refusal by Doolittle, as was within his constitutionally entrenched rights, to take the breathalyzer test as had been requested by Officer Norder. The second legal issue in the scenario is that of search and seizure, and the right to privacy which prohibits arbitrary search of one’s person, home or property without either a warrant or a reasonable cause. While the search and seizure doctrine would have normally required the serving of a search warrant to Doolittle before Officer Norder searched his car, the beer can that was in plain sight negated the provisions of the clause hence offering the officer the opportunity to search the car. In this scenario, Officer Norder was right to search the car though the loaded handgun and the unmarked bag of pills could be thrown out in court during subsequent proceedings, as they were circumstantial at best, as Slobogin (2013) advances in consideration of the exceptions to the search and seizure doctrine.

Concerning the action of Doolittle after his arrest and subsequent release, the issue of defamation comes to the fore regarding his blog, aptly calling for the death of Home Décor and its CEO. These statements and depiction through the picture of the logo and CEO in a casket were within his right and discretion and amount to no actionable legal issue. In the blog however, Doolittle made a number of libelous statements and impressions. For one, he clearly portrayed the boss as a witch, in a picture of the boss flying on a broomstick. This action could result in the boss, if he so wishes, seeking legal redress, for which Doolittle would be held responsible. This is because the truth of such a depiction is not very probable, and as such the depiction amounts to defamation of character which could injure the image, standing and reputation of the boss in the society, as Ardia (2013, p. 55) observe of remedies for defamation. The second article, in which Doolittle hinted at a colleague having an affair with her manager may not meet the threshold of libel because the reference to the colleague is only vague and not clear enough as to pose the risk of injury to neither character nor reputation. The article would also not be termed libelous for there is a certain likelihood of truth in it.

Still on the case of Doolittle, the issue of defamation, specifically slander, comes up in the events following his application for a job at DIY Home Innovations. When Lida Lott, the HR Manager at Home Décor received a call from the HR department at DIY Home Innovations seeking to obtain a reference on Doolittle, she was involved in a character assassination effort. In claiming, though “off the record,” that Doolittle may have been involved with drugs, Lott lied and therefore caused injury to the character and reputation of Doolittle, costing him a possible job offer at DIY Home Innovations. In this regard therefore, Doolittle, should he find out about the slander by Lott, could seek legal redress and would certainly win some remedy for the damages caused, provided, as Marton, Wilk & Rogal (2010, p. 53) claim, that he can prove such damage.

Regarding the new employee in advertising, Lacey Fair, and her use of images from other web sites, the legal issues that arise are the use of intellectual property as outlined by Susan Wynns and the doctrine of fair use, as claimed by Lacey herself. While the doctrine of fair use provides that individuals may use, to a limited extent, copyrighted materials without express permission for the provider, the doctrine does not include plagiarism, as Lacey did but rather limits such use to commentaries, criticisms, parodies, research and news reports, and search engines as Netanel (2011, p. 715). Nowhere does the fair use doctrine include pictures from individual websites. Seeing as Lacey, in acquiring the pictures from various websites without either citation or credit to the publishers, infringed on intellectual property rights, she could be sued for such infringement and pay damages to the aggrieved parties.

Ethical Issues in the Scenario

From the scenario, ethical issues also arise from the deeds and misdeeds of the characters involved. First, Doolittle acted unethically in using the property of the company for personal use, in clear contravention of company policy and of professional ethics. Further, in engaging in private business during work hours, he also went against the professional ethics which require one to dedicate work hours to work related business and engagements. Secondly, in starting a blog which called for the death of his former employer, Home Décor, Doolittle acted with neither professionalism nor the requisite decorum of professionals. He flouted several ethical considerations in going as far as insulting his former boss and tainting the name of not just the boss but also the company and the employee whom he alleged was having an affair with the boss. Doolittle should have acted professionally and desisted from the smear campaign he started against his former employer and colleagues.

Unethical and unprofessional conduct is however not limited to the actions of Doolittle alone. The Human Resource manager at Home Décor, Lida Lott, acted unethically in the discharge of her duties when she was called by the HR department at DIY Home Innovations. In deliberately trying to block the company from hiring Doolittle, she made up lies; “off the record,” about Doolittle’s involvement with drugs, a very unethical act which was intended to satisfy her whims. Considering the behavior of Lott, the proper and ethical thing to do would have been to advise the HR department at DIY Home Innovations of the facts she had rather than manufacture lies to harm the character of their former employee, Doolittle.

Ethical issues also arise in the case of Home Décor creating a position specifically for the granddaughter of the CEO. As it turns out, the lady, Lacey Fair, had not even completed her studies at the university, which means she had not even qualified for the position yet. While it is not wrong to create positions in organizations, it is not ethical to do such creation for an individual because of the sway they hold, as was the case of Lacey Fair who happened to be related to the boss. Another ethical issue also arises, as Doolittle claimed, in the case of the female employee who had an affair with the boss. This stretches the limit of ethical conduct at the workplace as it leads to a conflict of interest on the part of both the boss and the employee in question. Such a relationship might spill over into the conduct of professional responsibilities by the two parties.

Further, issues of ethics also arise in the conduct of Lacey Fair, in regards to her fulfillment of the role of an advertising executive. By lifting pictures from other websites in order to use in that of Home Décor, the granddaughter of the CEO flouted provisions of respect for intellectual property and infringed on the copyrights of the publishers of such pictures. In so doing, she acted unethically and went ahead to justify the actions using the doctrine of fair use which does not apply to her case.

Conclusion

Many of the actions of the characters involved in the scenario above present either ethical issues or legal issues with most of those issues arising from the conduct of the characters in regard to the fulfillment of their jobs. Some however present both ethical and legal issues.