No Need to ‘Tender Back’ Severance Pay in Bias Case: 6th Cir.

A woman who accepted $4,000 in severance pay after being fired wasn’t required to return the money before filing a lawsuit, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit said.

Jena McClellan says she was “bullied” into a severance agreement after she told her boss she was pregnant. The trial court had ruled in the employer’s favor before trial, citing a common law doctrine that a plaintiff has to “tender back” any compensation she had received before filing a lawsuit based on a contract, and McClellan hadn’t done that.

That was error, Judge Eric Clay said, writing for a ...