As previously reported, the Warshawsky Law Firm represents a former insurance company employee who was fired after her request for a religious exemption to the company’s COVID-19 vaccination policy was denied.  She started her lawsuit pro se and was facing the company’s proposed motion to dismiss when she retained us to take over her case.

Even though we filed an amended complaint on her behalf, which clearly demonstrated the factual and legal issues supporting her claims, the company still filed its motion.  What a waste of time!  As we told the judge, “Defendant’s proposed motion is, quite frankly, frivolous.”  Well, the judge may not have agreed that the motion was frivolous, but he agreed that it was unfounded.  “[T]he Court finds that all of Plaintiff’s claims survive Defendant’s motion to dismiss.”  Motion denied!

The Court (Hon. Andrew L. Carter, Jr.) rejected the company’s argument that our client’s objections to the COVID-19 vaccines were not truly religious in nature:  “The Court takes Plaintiff at her word when she alleges that she is a Christian, that ‘[a]s a rule, [she does] not take vaccines of any kind[,]’ and that ‘[her] beliefs surrounding [her] personal health practices themselves are closely tied to [her] sincerely held spiritual beliefs.’”  The Court also rejected as “semantical at best” the company’s argument that our client “chose” not to take the vaccines as opposed to being “required” not to take the vaccines.

This was a big win for our client, whose case now proceeds to the discovery phase of the litigation, but also for other employees facing similar motions to dismiss who now have a persuasive precedent on the books that they can rely upon in their cases.  Thank you, Judge Carter!

The case is Linda A. Rowett v. ProSelect Insurance Company d/b/a Coverys, No. 24-CV-5417-ALC, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.