Now, I don’t know if he doped or not, there’s no evidence that he did ( you can make all the assumptions you want, he’s never had a positive test )
I don’t know if lied about being in Mexico or not, the evidence that he did is not clear.
I’ve learned everything I know about the US legal system from Television ( CNN, Court TV, TV fiction ), so we need to assume that I’m completely ignorant about the subjeect. We do know however that ST boasts a few lawyers in it membership.
Let’s assume for a minute that Rabobank is based in New York, would their lawyers have allowed them to sack Rasmussen based on the somewhat sketchy evidence against him?
How much in damages would Rasmussen’s lawyers be after.
Will Rasmussen go after Rabobank with his lawyers anyway?
Now, I don’t know if he doped or not, there’s no evidence that he did ( you can make all the assumptions you want, he’s never had a positive test )
I don’t know if lied about being in Mexico or not, the evidence that he did is not clear.
I’ve learned everything I know about the US legal system from Television ( CNN, Court TV, TV fiction ), so we need to assume that I’m completely ignorant about the subjeect. We do know however that ST boasts a few lawyers in it membership.
Let’s assume for a minute that Rabobank is based in New York, would their lawyers have allowed them to sack Rasmussen based on the somewhat sketchy evidence against him?
**Hypothetically speaking, of course, I know of a situation where an employee was essentially fired a couple weeks ago by a company because he lied to them and thereby violated a clear term of his contract. He doesn’t have a claim, either for wrongful discharge or even for unemployment comp. **
How much in damages would Rasmussen’s lawyers be after. Could be going after lots of money because lots of attorneys file lawsuits that lack merit. Unlikely to win anything because the case should get thrown out. **
Will Rasmussen go after Rabobank with his lawyers anyway? **
“My boss is mad,” he added, claiming that he hadn’t lied over his wherabouts for last month’s test.
“I wasn’t in Italy, no way. That’s the story of one man (former cyclist and now an Italian television presenter Davide Cassani) who thinks he saw me. But there’s not the slightest proof.”
Rasmussen was dropped after Cassani claimed on Italian television station RAI that he’d seen the cyclist in June in the Italian Dolomites at a time when he’d told his team he was preparing for the Tour de France in Mexico.
He says he did not admit it!
Sadly Rasmussen is the center of a witchhunt- including the fans, cycling organizations and the Tour. He is booted from the tour by his team, who was pressured by the Tour, never having tested positive on allegations by a single guy who may have had ulterior motives or just may be mistaken. He is given no chance to defend himself. Meanwhile admitted doper Millar preaches from a soapbox.
McCarthy would be proud!
If he was in America and Rabobank was an American team, there would be a huge freaking lawsuit roaring down the pipes. There might be over there as well. If I was denied to pursue my trade and had the greatest moment of my professional life taken away because of unfounded accusations, I would be suing the crap out of some people.
Rasmussen violated terms of his contract with the team by lying to the team about his whereabouts. They have very solid evidence of this. My guess is once they heard the rumor he was in Italy when he had told them he was in Mexico, they pulled his passport out of his luggage and took a look at it. Virtually every company in the US has a policy that allows searches of personal effects like purses, desks etc brought onto company premises and the team bus where I assume all the luggage is during a stage would qualify (they’re paying for his room so they could search that too if they wanted). Barring a search, they could just ask him for it. If he gives it to them he’s screwed, if he refuses, they fire him for refusing to cooperate in the investigation.
Rasmussen’s termination is actually cleaner than Vino’s. Vino had a positive A test but the confirming test on the B sample has not been done yet so there is at least the possibility hanging over the team’s head that the A test could have been a mistake. The safer course there would have been to supend him without pay until the B sample came back but for PR purposes, it was worth the risk to terminate him immediately.
US companies fire alot of people every year for positive drug tests (mostly alcohol). For US companies, firing someone because of “doping” is a routine matter and it rarely results in a lawsuit. So even in our litigation happy society, if the team wanted to get rid of the guy, they would not hesitate to pull the trigger.
Lying to your employer is generally grounds for dismissal.
Not saying that Ras did or did not lie, I don’t know one way or the other. But one would hope that Rabobank has more than just the word of one person that Ras was in Italy.
Employer: he lied
Employee’s lawyer: He did not
Employer: yes you did, “Joe” said he saw you in Italy when you said you were in Mexico
Employee’s lawyer: Erm, here are his travel receipts and passport stamp from the trip, do you have any photographs or any real evidence showing that my client was in Italy?
Employee’s lawyer:No?? Please give my client boatloads of money
They have very solid evidence of this. My guess is …
So you don’t really know if they have slid evidence, you are just pulling this out of the air. You could be a reporter for Fox News!
I never claimed to be a reporter, I, like everyone else here, is an editorialist thus free to express opinion unconstraned by facts
Yes, I am engaging in wild unsubstantiated spectulation but it is based on some personal knowledge of how these things go down. It is just a guess but it is an educated guess. I’ve counseled companies on firing people in these types of situations (dishonesty) and looking at documents that could verify the truth or falsity of the employee’s story is so routine a first step in any such investigation that, at least based on my experience, it’s virtually impossible that it was not done before they terminated him. Since proving someone was in Italy at a time they claim to have been in Mexico is so easy, it would be idiotic for them to risk firing him for lying without making sure they were right and that he did, in fact, lie to them. This is so easy to verify one way or another and the cost of being wrong is so high (millions of dollars) that I am confident they had proof in hand before acting.
I never claimed to be a reporter, I, like everyone else here, is an editorialist thus free to express opinion unconstraned by facts
Yes, I am engaging in wild unsubstantiated spectulation but it is based on some personal knowledge of how these things go down. It is just a guess but it is an educated guess. I’ve counseled companies on firing people in these types of situations (dishonesty) and looking at documents that could verify the truth or falsity of the employee’s story is so routine a first step in any such investigation that, at least based on my experience, it’s virtually impossible that it was not done before they terminated him. Since proving someone was in Italy at a time they claim to have been in Mexico is so easy, it would be idiotic for them to risk firing him for lying without making sure they were right and that he did, in fact, lie to them. This is so easy to verify one way or another and the cost of being wrong is so high (millions of dollars) that I am confident they had proof in hand before acting.
If you are stating opinion, you should state it like opinion, not like a fact. You are no Bill O’Reilly!
If you have counseled companies in these types of situations, you should know that nobody has to defend themselves from accusations that cannot be proven. If somebody came to my company and told them that I had been stealing from them, they would expect him/her to prove it before they ever approached me. If they tried to make me defend myself against something with no facts that could not be proven, I would become very wealthy.
How are you sure they have some proof of anything? Again, you are pulling that out of the air (and air is not the word I would normally use).
According to the spokesperson for the Rabo team, Theo de Rooy (team director) confronted Rasmussen, who immediately confessed to both de Rooy and his team members.
