Lydia Cruz-Moore didn’t like the way her co-workers did their jobs, and she wasn’t afraid to say so. When she told one of them, Marianna Cole-Rivera, that she planned to talk to the boss about it, Cole-Rivera reached out to her colleagues for their input. She posted the following on her Facebook status: "Lydia Cruz, a coworker feels that we don’t help our clients enough at [employer]. I about had it! My fellow coworkers how do u feel?"
The co-workers responded, objecting to Cruz-Moore’s criticism. Cruz-Moore posted her own response, accusing Cole-Rivera of lying. Then she reported the exchange to her bossthe employer’s executive directorwho had her print out the Facebook exchange and turn it in. The executive director thinks it sounds like bullying and harassment by Cruz-Moore’s co-workers, and the employer has a zero-tolerance policy for that sort of thing. But can she lawfully fire the co-workers for their online activity?
