Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, DISCRIMINATION—PREGNANCY—S.D. Ohio: Home healthcare company defeats quality-assurance director’s pregnancy bias, FMLA interference claims, (Aug 12, 2026)

By Mandavi Singh, LL.M.

The employee could not show that pregnancy or protected leave, rather than her transmission of confidential operational data to a former executive, motivated her discharge.

A home healthcare company secured the dismissal of a former quality-assurance director’s pregnancy-discrimination claims under the PDA and the Ohio Civil Rights Act and her interference claim under the FMLA. Although the employee established a prima facie pregnancy-discrimination case, she presented no evidence that the company’s stated reason for discharging her, sending confidential information to a former executive associated with a competing business, was pretextual (Steele v. Summit Home Healthcare, LLC, No. 2:24-cv-3674 (S.D. Ohio Aug. 11, 2026)).

Confidential report. The company provides in-home nursing care to hospice patients. The employee joined it as a contingent registered nurse case manager in 2014, became a full-time employee in 2015, and received several promotions during her nearly 10-year tenure. She eventually became director of quality assurance.

In 2022, the company’s CEO began discussing the formation of a separate home healthcare business with several employees. He asked the quality-assurance director whether she would join the new company, although she testified that she never agreed to do so.

The CEO took medical leave in January 2023. During his absence, the company’s director of operations resigned. Several days later, the CEO instructed the employee to provide the former operations director with the company’s Master Weekly Report, explaining that the director was returning to the company. The former director supplied a personal email address, and the employee sent him access to the report. The report contained companywide operational information, including patient-interaction, referral, and growth data.

The company terminated the CEO the following day. The employee did not disclose that he had instructed her to send the report to the former operations director.

Maternity leave. The employee began approved maternity leave on May 30, 2023, after notifying the company of her pregnancy months earlier. On the same day, her supervisor discovered that the former operations director still had access to the Master Weekly Report through his personal email address.

Company leadership and IT investigated the disclosure. On June 8, IT confirmed that the employee had sent the report. Her supervisor subsequently recommended terminating her, expressing concern that she had knowingly shared company information with a former executive who was then in direct competition with the company and might use it to suggest the company was struggling.

A June 21 email also stated that another employee was capable of assuming the quality-assurance position. The company discharged the employee on June 30, four weeks into her maternity leave, citing an ethics violation involving the disclosure of company information to a nonemployee. A nonpregnant employee replaced her.

The employee later worked for the former CEO’s new home healthcare company from November 2023 until May 2024. After receiving an EEOC right-to-sue notice, she asserted pregnancy discrimination under federal and Ohio law and FMLA interference.

Prima facie case. The court analyzed the federal and state pregnancy-discrimination claims together under the burden-shifting framework established by McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 802 (1973). The employee had to show that she was pregnant, qualified for her position, was subjected to an adverse employment action, and that a nexus existed between her pregnancy and the discharge.

The company argued that the employee was not qualified because disclosing the report violated its confidentiality expectations. The court disagreed. Her qualifications had to be assessed independently of the conduct that allegedly caused her discharge. Her nursing degree, repeated promotions, nearly decade-long tenure, and receipt of a $20,000 performance-based bonus shortly before the discharge established that she was qualified.

The employee also established the required nexus. Although the company had known about her pregnancy for several months, it discharged her four weeks after she began maternity leave and replaced her with a nonpregnant employee. Given the relatively light burden at the prima facie stage, that evidence was sufficient.

Stated reason. The company satisfied its burden of articulating a legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason for the discharge. It presented evidence that the employee had violated company policy by sharing confidential information with a former executive using his personal email address.

The employee argued that the company could not meet its burden because it failed to identify the ultimate decision-maker. Two company officials provided somewhat different accounts of who made the final decision, and the person allegedly responsible for that decision was not deposed.

The court found the disagreement immaterial at this stage. The relevant witnesses consistently testified that the employee was discharged for distributing confidential information to a nonemployee. The company needed only to articulate a legally sufficient nondiscriminatory reason; it did not have to prove at this stage that the explanation was the employer’s actual motivation.

No pretext. The employee contended that the company’s timeline and explanations were contradictory. Its EEOC position statement asserted that it decided to terminate her immediately after discovering the disclosure, but the company confirmed her involvement on June 8 and did not discharge her until June 30. Moreover, the June 21 email proposed revisiting an earlier decision to allow her to remain employed.

The court distinguished a reconsidered disciplinary decision from a changing justification. Under Thurman v. Yellow Freight Systems, Inc., 90 F.3d 1160, 1167-68 (6th Cir. 1996), an employer’s changing rationale for an adverse action can support a finding of pretext. Here, however, the company consistently identified the transmission of the Master Weekly Report as its reason—when it discharged the employee, before the EEOC, and during the litigation.

The June 21 email reinforced rather than contradicted that explanation. It detailed the supervisor’s concerns about the report’s contents, the recipient’s connection to a competing business, and the possibility that the employee would continue disclosing information. The company’s decision to reconsider the appropriate punishment after further discussion did not amount to a substitution of a new rationale.

Nor did the availability of a nonpregnant replacement establish pretext. That evidence helped the employee establish her prima facie case but, without more, did not demonstrate that pregnancy actually motivated the discharge. The uncertainty over the ultimate decisionmaker likewise did not shift the employee’s burden to the company. Testimony and contemporaneous emails documented leadership’s shared concern about the disclosure, while the employee produced no evidence connecting the decision to her pregnancy.

The court acknowledged that the former CEO had instructed the employee to send the report. It nevertheless declined to second-guess whether discharge was an appropriate business response. The relevant question was whether the company acted for a discriminatory reason, and the record did not support that inference.

FMLA interference. The company conceded that the employee was eligible for FMLA protection, that it was a covered employer, that she was entitled to leave, and that she gave adequate notice. The dispute concerned whether her termination interfered with benefits to which she was entitled.

The court explained that an employer does not interfere with FMLA rights when it takes the challenged action for a legitimate reason unrelated to the employee’s leave.

The employee’s discharge during maternity leave did not by itself establish interference. The record contained no evidence that company officials reacted adversely to her pregnancy announcement, considered her leave burdensome, or relied on the leave when making the decision. Instead, contemporaneous records documented the discovery and investigation of the report disclosure and leadership’s conclusion that the conduct warranted discharge.

Because the employee failed to produce evidence that pregnancy or FMLA leave motivated the termination, the court granted the company’s summary judgment motion on all claims and denied her partial summary judgment motion.

The case is No. 2:24-cv-3674.

Judge: Marbley, A.

Attorneys: Dennis Antonio Gleason (Mezibov Butler) for Amanda Steele. Felix John Gora (Rendigs Fry Kiely & Dennis) for Summit Home Healthcare LLC.

Companies: Summit Home Healthcare LLC

Cases: PregnancyDiscrimination Discrimination EmployeeLeave Discharge OhioNews