Nurses who are members of California Nurses Association gathered in front of Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena, California last week and urge the institution to reinstate a Filipino-American nurse together with another medical staff who were fired from their job last year. They were allegedly suspended and later dismissed after an internal investigation revealed their advocacy to form a union at the hospital.
Alysha Almada and Vicki Lin joined the protest last week as part of their plan to add pressure to the management of Huntington Memorial Hospital. Filipino-American Alysha and her colleague were initially placed on a cyclic preventive suspension and reinstatement last year. After the repeating incident of suspension, they were fully terminated without proper justification last summer 2015. Both of them immediately filed charges of retaliation and “unfair” termination with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).
In the recent development of the case, the NLRB officials mentioned that the charges filed by the two nurses have merits causing the government body to request the reinstatement of their work at the Huntington Memorial Hospital. The members of the board are now given ample time to accomplish the petition. If they will decline the request of NLRB, the hospital will face indictment.
In an interview, Alysha claimed that she was illegally fired by her employer after the management learned that she is advocating the creation of a union at the Huntington Memorial Hospital. She also pointed out that the rally aimed to raise awareness to nurse community whose rights were also violated in that same hospital.
Here's the video interview courtesy of ABS-CBN news.
List of charges involving Huntington Memorial Hospital and its previous employees
In January 2011, former director of construction for Huntington Memorial Hospital "David Hamedany" was arrested on federal mail fraud arising from his role in a construction kickback scheme which allegedly occurred from 2006 until June 2010 that brought him more than $3 million in illegal payments.
Dr. Kevin Paul Anderson, who worked as a neonatologist in Huntington hospital, was indicted on a capital murder charge for allegedly strangling a pregnant pediatrician on a secluded mountain road on November 11, 1999. In an attempt to cover up the crime, he dumped the car of the victim down a cliff not far from where the incident occurred.
Some time after December 31, 1992, Huntington Memorial Hospital terminated an employee named Joan Stevenson due to age discrimination. Stevenson took a medical leave of absence approved by the hospital but when she reported back to the medical institution, she was not reinstated for her previous job.