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What
should an employer do when police or process servers demand
to see an employee at the workplace?
Employers have a legal duty to cooperate with law enforcement
in criminal investigations. Similarly, state law may require
that employers cooperate with process servers. For example,
Florida law requires that employers allow process servers to
serve employees with summons, subpoenas, and other process at
the workplace in a private area designated by the employer.
However, employers must balance these legal duties with concerns
for workplace security and employees' privacy rights.
A written policy on handling visits from police and process
servers as part of a larger policy on crisis management enables
employers to respond appropriately and with minimal disruption.
This policy should be distributed to all employees with training
provided to ensure compliance. Include instructions to the
receptionist on how to respond to requests by police or process
servers. For example, if law enforcement officers are in plain
clothes, the receptionist should ask for identification unless
police indicate that the matter is an urgent crisis, such
as a bomb threat or other potential violence. The receptionist
should be cooperative, but quickly determine the purpose and
severity of the visit, then advise a designated manager immediately.
This manager should be trained to deal with a wide variety
of requests from police and process servers. Additionally,
a second manager should be designated and trained to handle
situations if the primary designee is unavailable. Either
the primary or secondary designee should meet with police
and process servers within minutes of their arrival to avoid
disruption. If police refuse to wait for a manager, the receptionist
should not attempt to stop them.
The designated manager should determine the nature of the
visit and work out a plan to cooperate with police or process
servers (where required by state law) while protecting the
affected employee's privacy and limiting danger to and disruption
of other workers. For example, the manager can agree to have
the employee's supervisor escort the employee to a conference
room or other area out of view. There, the supervisor can
explain that the employer has a legal duty to comply with
requests from law enforcement or to allow service of process.
However, if police request that they be given documents or
other items, the manager should ask to see a subpoena or search
warrant before complying. Contact legal counsel immediately
if questions about compliance arise.
Once a police visit has concluded, the employer may need
to make an announcement to other employees or the media about
what has occurred. Any announcement should take into consideration
the employee's privacy rights under federal and state laws
and potential liability to the employer for disseminating
or withholding information.
If you need more information on crafting this or any other
employment policy, contact the attorney at Coffman, Coleman,
Andrews at Grogan that you normally deal with or any of our
attorneys.
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