As to the 75 thousand dollar threshold, there need not have been discussions about the damages at issue in the case - and typically, with such a contentious firing the lawyers would rather poke their own eyes out than have their clients become aware that they had even a brief conversation of a co-operative nature with opposing counsel (and as to contentiousness here, the captain didn't retain just any old contingency trial lawyer and this seems directly reflective of the high temperatures on both sides). Not saying it did not happen or is impossible, but that it was not a necessity: the defendant can meet its legal requirement for federal court diversity jurisdiction (via "removal") even if the complaint itself formalistically only alleges damages in excess of 10 thousand (among other reasons, the complaint includes a claim for punitive damages, and any wrongful termination claim carries with it (as a yardstick for damages) the contractual value of the plaintiff's employment). Not clear as to whether the case actually was removed or not, but at the risk of legal cliché, defendant ought to remove it, for all sorts of reasons about the differences between the ways federal trial-level courts operate as compared to state courts.
On the issue of safety rules and whether a wrongful termination suit under state law can or should be a vehicle to uphold the importance of such rules....a prior post mentioned "preemption" and without spilling a ton more electronic ink, IIRC the idea that even using federal safety regulations (by OSHA, or FAA, or the NRC) as a predicate for any state's public policy exception to the employment at-will doctrine can be met with a preemption defense. At the risk of legal over-simplification, the defense argues that because federal law (including administrative regulations) occupies the entire field, a state court cannot even rule on a claim like the ones in the captain's complaint, or otherwise interpret federal rules. Not saying it always is a winning defense but (IIRC) it does get litigated. (And provides an example of why the defendant will prefer to be before an Article III federal district court judge, in preference to any state court.)
Last, about Section 42121 - and without drilling into a probably-overly-abstruse parsing and construction of the statutory terms - this captain isn't really within the paradigm of the whistleblower principle. He didn't oppose or report a safety violation, nor did he testify in a suit on behalf of someone who did. Rather, he acted in conformance with a safety rule. Not saying AIR21 is a bad law but, not convinced it contains the answer to the evident gaps in the state of the law, insofar as the type of claims this Allegiant captain has filed.
Thanks for the measured dialogue, for which PPRuNe is so famously and vastly (if not always) known . . ..
