Here's a case from San Antonio involving Tom's Seafood Inn. Sonya Ortega worked as a waitress for five years, until she was fired in 1995. As an employee, she had been earlier given two previous disciplinary warnings. Two managers at the restaurant told their boss, the general manager, that Ortega planned to stage a walkout with all the other waitresses bug me genet her shift. She also purportedly spread an unfounded rumor that one of the managers was fired for calling in sick. All of this was based on hearsay.

While Ortega denied planning a massive walkout or spreading the rumor, the general manager decided to terminate her. Ortega's termination documents said she was fired because:

1)"She has been working behind the scenes attempting to lure fellow employees to leave Tom's Seafood Inn" And

2)"She is spreading rumors about a manager being fired for calling in sick."

Ortega, by contrast, said she was fired for her national origin. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission investigated but it took a very long time to find reasonable cause that Tom's Seafood Inn violated the law. Finally, almost four years after she was fired, Ortega filed a lawsuit. The lawsuit was thrown out in November, 2000, but she appealed to the Texas Court of Appeals, and last month, over six years after she was fired, the court said she gets to take her case to a jury

Why? She said she was treated differently than other employees, and that's discrimination.

Her evidence was that another employee of a different national origin told Tom's Seafood Inn employees she could use her connections at a different restaurant to get them a job. Not unreasonably, the restaurant said that offer was a whole lot different than somebody planning to take everybody out of the restaurant during a busy shift.

1. Who is right?

2. Were the issues handled appropriately by the company?

3. Should she be fired? Justify your answer.