Newborn Death Verdict Displays Tort Law Power in Work Disputes

A $22.5 million verdict that an Ohio company’s denial of a pregnant employee’s work-from-home request contributed to her newborn’s death shows more costly legal outcomes arise when medical accommodation lawsuits can be litigated as tort claims, not discrimination cases.

A Cincinnati jury last month found Total Quality Logistics LLC liable for the premature birth and death of Chelsea Walsh’s infant in February 2021 after the company denied Walsh’s physician-recommended request to work remotely due to her pregnancy complications. TQL, according to court documents, placed Walsh on unpaid leave despite her objections and repeated requests to work remotely. Walsh’s daughter, Magnolia, died 90 minutes after she was born at only 20 weeks.

Although presented as a wrongful death case, the verdict raises employment liability concerns over strict return-to-office policies and federal requirements to accommodate pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions, legal scholars and attorneys said. Mishandling medically required accommodation requests additionally could trigger workers’ compensation claims, they added.

The verdict also comes as courts increasingly scrutinize remote work as a reasonable accommodation under laws like the Americans with Disabilities Act, which protects pregnant workers with medical issues. Those cases often turn on whether accommodations remove essential job functions and, in some cases, deny employers deference to policies requiring physical presence, a standard that was common before Covid-19, legal observers said.

The jury found TQL 90% at fault, making it responsible for about $22.5 million of the $25 million award. Ohio tort law allowed the baby’s estate to seek compensation for the injury TQL’s actions caused. Tort law remedies civil wrongs, whether intentional or negligent.

“Tort law has a nimbleness and a versatility to act more swiftly to make societal course corrections than statutory law,” said Jamie Abrams, a tort law and reproductive rights legal scholar at American University’s Washington College of Law. “Pregnancy discrimination claims are typically possible claims when the core harm was an employment outcome, such as termination or promotion denial. Here, the heart of the claim was a core tort harm.”

Pursuing a wrongful death rather than a statutory pregnancy discrimination claim may have been a “creative way” to bypass federal damage caps, since Ohio doesn’t limit damages recoverable for the estate’s case, said Jill Wieber Lens, a tort law and reproductive rights professor at the University of Iowa College of Law.

“We’re looking at potentially a lot more damage if we’re talking about pregnancy loss, like this case where a newborn died,” she said.

However, legal scholars said pursuing a tort claim was more appropriate here than a traditional workplace case.

Counsel for the estate lauded the verdict in a statement.

TQL expressed condolences to Walsh’s family in a statement, but disagreed with the verdict and said it’s “currently evaluating its legal options for an appeal.”

Employer’s Legal Duty

Walsh, who worked as a claims associate at TQL, was told she could either remain on unpaid leave or return to in-person work after undergoing a procedure to reduce her chances of premature labor, according to the suit.

She returned to work to maintain her income and company-sponsored health insurance eligibility. Her remote work request was approved upon her return, but she went into labor later that day.

In the tort context, where the unborn may be considered a separate legal entity, the case raises complex questions about employers’ legal obligations because of varying state laws on when life and legal rights begin, Lens said.

At least 17 states have established fetal rights by law or court rulings to apply criminal or civil laws granting fetuses—and in some instances embryos and fertilized eggs —the same legal rights as born people, according to advocacy group Pregnancy Justice.

TQL’s defense largely focused on whether Magnolia was a previable fetus, which generally holds no independent legal rights and would affect the estate’s ability to sue, and if the employer owed a legal duty to the child.

In denying TQL’s motion for summary judgment, the judge concluded that Magnolia had full rights as she was born breathing and was issued a birth certificate, as Ohio law requires for infants born at 20 weeks.

The court found TQL’s claim of no legal duty to Magnolia before birth “misplaced,” as evidence at summary judgment showed the company “should have anticipated some injury in their course of action” when denying Walsh’s work accommodation request.

The University of Iowa’s Lens agreed with the court’s causation analysis, noting that TQL’s employment policies created a risk to the fetus given its legal duty to meet Walsh’s needs.

TQL’s duty of care argument, however, was “persuasive” because the company did not “actively” cause the infant’s death, she said.

American University’s Abrams said the case revealed “gaps” in federal leave protections as well as “flaws” in employer-based health care. “Those structural and systemic flaws really spoke to this jury in this moment,” she said.

Anti-Bias, Worker Comp Risks

Since the case’s events occurred, Congress enacted legal protections.

TQL’s actions likely would have violated the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act—passed in 2022 and enacted the following year—that sets minimum standards for reasonable accommodations, replacing a patchwork of case law and state protections, said Stefanie Camfield, an associate general counsel at HR provider Engage PEO.

The verdict emphasizes the liability risks when employers categorically deny accommodation requests, fail to engage in an interactive process, or ignore medical advice, Camfield said.

She recommended companies document accommodation inquiries and outcomes, ensuring they are justified by legitimate job reasons. Denying remote work during a high-risk pregnancy is legally risky, especially if the employee successfully worked remotely during Covid and the job is primarily desk-based, Camfield added.

An injury to a pregnant worker might also trigger a workers’ compensation claim, Lens and Camfield said. But that depends on a company’s worker compensation policy and varied state laws, which may also prevent suits concerning injuries in utero.