Beasley, Allen, Crow, Methvin, Portis & Miles, P.C.

One would think that a woman who is gang raped by seven coworkers, then locked in a shipping container for more than 24 hours without food, water or even a bed, would be able to find justice. After all, this is the United States. We have justice written into our constitution, our pledge of allegiance, and the very fabric of society. But for Jamie Leigh Jones, a 21-year-old Halliburton computer technician working in Iraq, obtaining justice against those fellow Halliburton employees who brutalized her has been a long, complicated and arduous battle. For years, Jones has been seeking compensation against her former employer for the way it handled the rape – by sticking her in a shipping container and threatening to fire her if she sought medical treatment outside of Iraq. Because of her employment contract with Halliburton, however, Jones has almost no legal recourse.

Upon returning to the U.S., Jones wanted to take Halliburton to court but was unable to take appropriate legal action because there was an arbitration agreement tucked into her employment contract, essentially a requirement for Jones to waive one of her fundamental rights of citizenship as a condition of employment. Instead of bringing her case before a jury, Jones spent 15 months in arbitration with Halliburton. The process was going nowhere. Out of 119 of Halliburton’s most recent arbitration cases, just 3 resulted in favor of the employee, and Jones’ case didn’t appear any more promising.

Jones and her attorney decided to fight the arbitration agreement itself, arguing that the rape was not related to her employment and therefore could not be excluded from court by the arbitration agreement. Last Tuesday, after 3 years of litigation, the federal court ruled in Jones’ favor 2 to 1.

“In the meantime, her case may bolster pending legislation that would ban mandatory arbitration clauses in employment and other consumer contracts,” observes the journal Mother Jones. “Jones’ victory comes as yet another body blow to a practice that has come under serious fire in recent months as heavily rigged against consumers.”

Jones recently launched a foundation in her name that is, according to its web site, “dedicated to helping United States citizens and legal residents who are victims of crime while working abroad for government contractors and subcontractors.”

To read more about Jamie Leigh Jones’ ordeals, both in Iraq and with the American justice system, visit The Jamie Leigh Foundation website.

This entry was posted on Monday, September 21st, 2009 at 3:37 pm and is filed under Legal, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.