A judge indicated he may demand $250 from the attorney for a former Los Angeles County environmental worker who is suing her ex-employer, alleging she was wrongfully denied a religious exemption to taking the previously mandated coronavirus vaccine.
Belinda Larsen’s Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit states that she was forced to resign due to a hostile work environment a year before the vaccination policy was lifted. No attorney appeared on Larsen’s behalf during Tuesday’s scheduled case management conference, so Judge Jerrold Abeles scheduled an April 17 hearing in which the lawyer will have to explain why he was not present and why he should not be fined $250.
In their previous court papers, county attorneys deny Larsen’s allegations and say the county is immune from liability.
Larsen’s lawsuit alleges religious discrimination, retaliation and failure to accommodate. She was hired by the county in September 1991 and at the time of her resignation was an environmental health specialist. The county’s mandatory employee coronavirus vaccination policy was enacted in August 2021 and workers were told to provide proof of their vaccinations by Oct. 1 of that year.
Larsen’s suit contends the regulation was not science-based and did not take into account the natural immunities of those who had the virus before or the fact that the injections’ effectiveness waned over time.
When Larsen filed for a religious exemption in September 2021, management demanded more information that infringed on her medical privacy rights, the suit states. Larsen also stated that she relied on herbs and organic food for healing and that vaccinations she received as a child were the choices of her parents and occurred before she became an adult, the suit filed Oct. 13 further states.
Management left its decision as “pending,” then retaliated against Larsen by taking away overtime work she had done for years and excluded her from team meetings and holiday gatherings that were open to her vaccinated colleagues, the suit states.
After Larsen saw her unvaccinated co-workers terminated, allegedly without due process, she became “terrified that she would be fired at any moment” and lose her lifetime medical benefits, the suit states. Larsen’s skills and work fit the niche of government work and were not conducive to private employment, according to her complaint.
Larsen’s work environment was so intolerable she took early retirement in late March 2022 with a much lower retirement package, according to the suit, which further states that the county’s COVID-19 vaccination policy was lifted in early April 2023.
Trial of Larsen’s case is scheduled for Oct. 4, 2027.