A series of rulings by Iowa administrative law judges has resulted in several terminated healthcare professionals being granted unemployment benefits after courts determined their employers failed to prove workplace misconduct. In these cases, the legal disputes centered on whether the employees’ actions warranted a denial of benefits, but judges consistently found that the companies did not provide sufficient evidence to support their claims of gross negligence or unprofessional behavior.
Among those awarded benefits was Garmai Rogers, a former employee of the WesleyLife nursing home chain. While the company accused Rogers of ignoring resident call lights and acting unprofessionally toward patients and staff, Judge Michael Lunn ruled in her favor. The judge noted that WesleyLife failed to produce a key incident report used to justify her firing and accepted Rogers’ testimony that state investigators had found insufficient evidence to substantiate abuse allegations. Similarly, Theresa Simpson, a certified nursing assistant at Terrace Hill Healthcare, was deemed eligible for benefits because her employer could not prove that complaints made against her during a resident council meeting were ever properly investigated or validated.
The rulings also extended to higher level management and specialized roles within the medical field. Heather Bartlett, a long term nursing manager at Covenant Medical Center with decades of service, was granted benefits after Judge James Timberland found no evidence of misconduct leading to her discharge. This came after Bartlett had raised concerns regarding changes to patient dietary programs and reported a hostile work environment involving her supervisor. Despite her history of positive performance reviews and high patient satisfaction scores, she was let go without what the court considered a qualifying reason for denying insurance payments.
Finally, Chasity Kephart, who served as a community health coach for Methodist Jennie Edmundson Hospital through a contract with the City of Council Bluffs, was also cleared for benefits. Although she was fired following an investigation into the sharing of confidential information—which led the city to terminate its contract early—Judge Stephanie Adkisson ruled there was no concrete evidence showing Kephart committed job related misconduct. Collectively, these decisions underscore a strict judicial requirement for employers to document and prove specific failures in conduct before they can strip dismissed workers of their safety net.