Swindol v. Aurora Flight Sciences Corp.

194 So. 3d 847, 41 I.E.R. Cas. (BNA) 356, 2016 Miss. LEXIS 131, 2016 WL 1165448
CourtMississippi Supreme Court
DecidedMarch 24, 2016
DocketNo. 2015-FC-01317-SCT
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 194 So. 3d 847 (Swindol v. Aurora Flight Sciences Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Mississippi Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Swindol v. Aurora Flight Sciences Corp., 194 So. 3d 847, 41 I.E.R. Cas. (BNA) 356, 2016 Miss. LEXIS 131, 2016 WL 1165448 (Mich. 2016).

Opinion

LAMAR, Justice,

for the Court:

¶ 1. This case presents a certified question from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. Robert Swindol sued his employer, Aurora Flight Sciences Corporation, in federal court for wrongful discharge and defamation. Swindol alleged that Aurora had terminated him for having a firearm inside his locked vehicle in the company parking lot. Aurora filed a motion to dismiss, and the district court dismissed Swindol’s wrongful-discharge claim with prejudice,1 stating that it “[could not] say [848]*848that the Mississippi Supreme Court would recognize a third exception to the doctrine of at-will employment,” as proposed by Swindol. As such, the district court found that Swindol had failed to state a claim for wrongful discharge. Swindol appealed, and the Fifth Circuit has now certified the following question to this Court:

Whether in Mississippi an employer may be liable for a wrongful discharge of an employee for storing a firearm in a locked vehicle on company property in a manner that is consistent with [Mississippi Code] Section 45-9-55.

Swindol v. Aurora Flight Sciences Corp., 805 F.3d 516, 523 (5th Cir.2015). The Fifth Circuit also concluded that it “would benefit from [this Court’s] analysis of whether Section 45-9-55(5) bars” Swin-dol’s suit. Id. at 522. We find that an employer may be liable and that Section 45-9-55(5) does not shield Aurora from liability under the facts of this case.

PACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

¶2. The Fifth Circuit summarized the facts as follows:

Swindol worked for Aurora Flight Sciences Corporation in Mississippi. He parked his car in Aurora’s parking lot with a firearm locked inside. Aurora’s managers learned about the firearm and fired Swindol later the same day for violating a company policy forbidding firearms on company property. Aurora then convened a plant-wide meeting during which its human resources manager told employees that Swindol was a security risk and instructed them to call the police if they saw him near the facility. Swindol sued Aurora in United States District Court in Mississippi. He asserted there was diversity jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1332. He brought state-law claims for wrongful discharge and defamation. Aurora moved to dismiss Swindol’s complaint under Rule 12(b)(6). The district court granted the motion, dismissing Swindol’s wrongful discharge claim with prejudice and his defamation claim without prejudice. Swindol appealed.

Id. at 520 (footnote omitted).

¶ 3. The Fifth Circuit began its discussion by noting Mississippi Code Section 45-9-55(1), which provides:

(1) Except as otherwise provided in subsection (2) of this section, a public or private employer may not establish, maintain, or enforce any policy or rule that has the effect of prohibiting a person from transporting or storing a firearm in a. locked vehicle in any parking lot, parking garage, or other designated parking area.

Miss.Code Ann. § 45-9-55(1) (Rev.2015). The cross-referenced subsection (2) provides a different rule for certain secured parking lots, but neither party claims that rule applies here.- Swindol, 805 F.3d at 521. It also is “undisputed that Aurora had a firearms policy that is inconsistent with [Section 45-9-55].” Id.

¶ 4. Swindol argued before the Fifth Circuit that it “should interpret Section 45-9-55 to create a ‘separate and additional public policy exception to the at-will doctrine’ because doing so would fortify Mississippi’s public policy supporting the right to bear arms,” Id. But the Fifth Circuit ultimately declined to do so, noting that it had “discovered no Mississippi case law addressing the effect of Section 45-9-55.”2 Id. The. Court went on to say that

[849]*849It is undisputed that Aurora had a firearms policy that is inconsistent .with the statute. Those facts still leave as questions - whether the firing violated the statute and whether it can be remedied in this action despite the employment-at-,will doctrine. We hesitate to intrude into such a seemingly well-settled, area of state law. As the Mississippi Supreme Court has held, employment at will means employers may fire employees “for good reason, bad reason, or no reason at all, excepting only reasons independently declared legally impermissible.” McArn v. Allied Bruce-Terminix Co., Inc., 626 So.2d 603, 606 (Miss.1993) (citation and quotations omitted). The two exceptions to the Mississippi employment-at-will doctrine identified by the McAm court over 20 years ago remain the only two recognized so far. Neither McAm exception applies here. See id. at 607.
Though the Mississippi Supreme Court has not expanded the exceptions after McAm, the court has been clear that the legislature has the authority to create new exceptions. See, e.g., Kelly v. Miss. Valley Gas Co., 397 So.2d 874, 876 (Miss.1981). In Kelly, 'the court held that the employment-at-will doctrine barred the plaintiffs ‘claims for retaliatory discharge based ón his employer’s firing him for exercising his statutory right to file a workmen’s compensation claim. Id. The: Kelly court based' its decision largely on the lack of a statutory provision expressly making it a crime for an employer to discharge an employee for filing such a claim. Id. The Mississippi statute here, though, goes beyond just giving rights to employees. It is express that an employer may not enforce a policy prohibiting employees from having weapons in their locked vehicles. See § [46-9-55]. The issue as we see it is whether that prohibition is sufficient to create an exception to the Mississippi ■ employment-at-will doctrine.

Id. at 521-22/ The Fifth Circuit decided also that' it would “benefit from [this Court’s] analysis of whether Section 45-9-55(5) bars this'suit.” Id. at 522. Section 45-9-55(5) provides:

(5) A public or private employer shall not be liable in a civil action for damages resulting from or arising out of an occurrence involving the transportation, storage, possession or use of a firearm covered by this section.

Miss,Code Ann. § 45-9-55(5) (Rev.2015).

¶ 5. So, the Fifth Circuit concluded,

Section 45-9-55 clearly expresses a public policy prohibiting employers from barring employees from possessing firearms in the manner the plaintiff claims • he did. Yet there'are no state-law authorities to guide us in deciding how this statute affects the employment-at-will doctrine. Mississippi state courts have not identified any exceptions to the doctrine beyond those in McAm. That consistency raises compelling comity interests that -stay our hand from adding an exception in federal court even were we to decide an exception had been statutorily created. , The Mississippi .Supreme Court is the only court that can definitively decide whether the well-settled M.cAm doctrine has been affected by Section 45-9-55.

Swindol,

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Bluebook (online)
194 So. 3d 847, 41 I.E.R. Cas. (BNA) 356, 2016 Miss. LEXIS 131, 2016 WL 1165448, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/swindol-v-aurora-flight-sciences-corp-miss-2016.