mcgeer%sirius.berkeley.edu@UCBVAX.BERKELEY.EDU (09/29/86)
>You misunderstand the constitution and the law. To be PRESUMED >innocent until proven guilty is a right due to all criminal suspects. >It has nothing to do with the behavior of private citizens and >corporations. For instance if a bank suspects a teller of >embezzling, they do not have to prove it in court and send him to >jail in order tofire him for it. Wrongo, Keith. Under current law in most states employers are subject to a civil suit if they dismiss an employee without cause, and may be forced to rehire the employee and pay damages if cause cannot be shown. Further, mere suspicion of theft without admissible, documented evidence is not generally held to be cause -- though I do believe that the burden of proof on an employer is not as great as that of the prosecution in a criminal trial. As an aside, this is an interesting contrast to the practice in Canada in the late '70's, when the Canadian federal government fired a tax auditor because he belonged to an anti-metrification group, and the dismissal was sustained in federal court. Since then Canada has incorporated a watered-down version of the US Bill of Rights in its Constitution, so it's not clear that they could dismiss the guy today. On the other hand, they can still toss you in the slammer there for claiming that the Holocaust didn't happen, so I wouldn't rely on the Canadian Charter of Rights for too much. -- Rick -------