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Tex. Fam. Code § 158.209

EMPLOYER'S PENALTY FOR DISCRIMINATORY HIRING OR DISCHARGE

Applied in 5 court decisions — leading case City of Midland v. O'BRYANT (2000)

Most recently applied in Gary Sawyer, Doug Kempf, Peter Barnaba, Sr., Geoff Rorrev, Tim Gregory v. E. I. Du Pont De Nemours and Company (April 2014)

Added by Acts 1995, 74th Leg., ch. 20, Sec. 1, eff

How often courts cite this section

199820002010201410
citing decisions per year

Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.

(a) An employer may not use an order or writ of withholding as grounds in whole or part for the termination of employment or for any other disciplinary action against an employee.

(b) An employer may not refuse to hire an employee because of an order or writ of withholding.

(c) If an employer intentionally discharges an employee in violation of this section, the employer continues to be liable to the employee for current wages and other benefits and for reasonable and necessary attorney's fees, court costs, and expenses incurred in enforcing the employee's rights as provided in this section. The court may order the fees, costs, expenses, and any postjudgment interest to be paid directly to the attorney, who may enforce the order in the attorney's own name by any means available for the enforcement of a judgment for debt.

(d) An action under this section may be brought by the employee, a friend of the court, the domestic relations office, or the Title IV-D agency.

Official source: Texas Constitution and Statutes. Reproduced from public-domain Texas statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.