Thread: Koran Burner Fired

The logic is sound. Derek Fenton made a public statement. You have to assume that public statements are heard by everyone - including your employers.

As long as he isn't at work representing the government in some official capacity he
should be able to burn whatever small scrap of paper he wants. I'm sure if his after
work hobby was immersing crucifixes in urine he would be good to go.

Originally Posted by Djinn

The logic is sound. Derek Fenton made a public statement. You have to assume that public statements are heard by everyone - including your employers.

So government workers who speak out against Christianity should be fired too?

Originally Posted by bla bla

As long as he isn't at work representing the government in some official capacity he
should be able to burn whatever small scrap of paper he wants. I'm sure if his after
work hobby was immersing crucifixes in urine he would be good to go.

And he did burn whatever he wanted to. No problem.

However, having an openly discriminatory employee in your ranks where he will work at times with people he openly despises is opening yourself up to lawsuits.

No one interfered with his burning, but it is a responsible employee that gets rid of these types of people as quick as possible.

"Mr. Fenton's public actions violated New Jersey Transit's code of ethics," an agency statement said.

Mr. Fenton, like all employees was given a handbook when he was first hired. To get hired, he had to not only agree with the set of rules set up by the employer, but read them. I'm not sure if he was arrested for creating a fire hazzard......but it sounds reasonable. He wasn't charged.....he was released........and his employer had every right to fire him.

Checking NY Transit has a union......my suggestion would be for Mr. Fenton to use them.

People shouldn't have less or more latitude with the their first amendment rights based on what type of job they have.

However....

"Mr. Fenton's public actions violated New Jersey Transit's code of ethics," an agency statement said.
"NJ Transit concluded that Mr. Fenton violated his trust as a state employee and therefore [he] was dismissed."

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/...#ixzz0zcNs0BK8

We're going to see this become a court case, and it'll be interesting to see what sections of New Jersey Transit's code of ethics he violated. If he did in fact violate a pre-existing standard that he'd previously agreed to...NJT is justified in firing him. If you want to work for NJT, and you've agreed in advance to wave certain freedoms of expression, too bad so sad.

I went to NJT's web site and the only code of ethics posted is one that relates to vendors. http://www.njtransit.com/tm/tm_servl...VendorEthicsTo

New Jersey State has a code of ethics

PDF WARNING.....www.state.nj.us/ethics/docs/ethics/uniformcode.pdf

And IMO the only two sections of that code that relate to this are:

4. No State officer or employee or special State officer or employee should knowingly act in any way that might reasonably be expected to create an impression or suspicion among the public having knowledge of his/her acts that he/she may be engaged in conduct violative of his trust as a State officer or employee or special State officer or employee.

So once again, they don't specify what "trust" means in this case.

Also,

V. POLITICAL ACTIVITY

Upon giving notice to the agency ELO, a State employee may be involved in political activities unless:

1. the State employee is prohibited from such activities by State or federal statute or agency rule; or
　
2. the political activity conflicts with the employee’s official duties.

So you can attend a political protest as long as you are not attending in an official capicity.

Guess we'll see.

I'm not passing judgement untill I know which exact section of the code of ethics this guy violated

i agree with goldwater. when you work for the gov't you sign away certain rights. depending on what they use it may be justified. you can cry free speech all you want. but certain jobs dont let you do certain things. you know this when you take the job. if you dont like it dont take the job. its really that simple.