Idaho employees who report knowledge of illegal business activities are considered to be whistleblowers. These unique individuals are given a number of rights from the federal and state governments to help protect their financial well-being. Understanding what a whistleblower is and their specific rights is important.
Who do whistleblowers report to?
In the event that employees witness illegal business activities at their place of employment, they can report those activities to various places. The first place they can report those activities to is the upper management of the business. This is difficult to do in many cases, especially if they believe that upper management is involved in the illegal business activity that is happening.
Whistleblowers can report to governing agencies like OSHA or the SEC. Specific governing bodies are more involved in different types of violations than others. For example, OSHA is interested in safety and environmental breaches. The SEC is more concerned with securities law violations.
What type of protection is a whistleblower granted?
Various federal employment law statutes grant protections for whistleblowers. It’s illegal for any company in the United States to retaliate against a whistleblower. This retaliation may be in the form of reprimands, terminations, relocations or demotions. In addition, no company may pursue legal action against the whistleblower to incur any losses that the company experienced during their investigation or any fines they’re responsible for paying. These are just some of the most important protection rights that whistleblowers are granted.
Whistleblowers are a necessary asset to help disclose information about illegal business activities that happen throughout the United States. Due to the important information that these individuals reveal, they are granted various protection rights through both federal and state laws. If you believe that you’ve experienced a violation of your whistleblower protection rights, it’s time to contact a lawyer.
