## Facts

- Philloria Green worked as an at-will employee in a medical office from December 1992 through August 1993.
- During her last week of work, Green was raped and severely beaten by her estranged husband and received medical treatment.
- Green returned to work shortly thereafter; another doctor informed Dr. Winston Murphy Bryant, Jr., her employer, about the attack.
- Bryant terminated Green’s employment; Green alleged Bryant stated the discharge was not performance-based but was because she was a victim of a violent crime.
- Green alleged Bryant retroactively terminated her health insurance, leaving her medical expenses uncovered.
- Green alleged she suffered migraine headaches and post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of the termination.

## Issues

1. Whether Pennsylvania’s narrow public-policy exception to at-will employment prohibits discharge based solely on an employee’s status as a victim of domestic violence or violent crime.
2. Whether the alleged termination and insurance cancellation state claims for negligent infliction of emotional distress or intentional infliction of emotional distress under Pennsylvania law.
3. Whether Pennsylvania recognizes an independent claim for breach of an implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing in an at-will employment relationship.

## Decision

- The court granted the employer’s Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss Counts II–V.
- The wrongful discharge claim was dismissed because no clear Pennsylvania statutory or constitutional mandate barred termination on the alleged basis.
- The negligent infliction of emotional distress claim was dismissed because the allegations did not fit recognized Pennsylvania categories for such liability.
- The intentional infliction of emotional distress claim was dismissed because the alleged conduct did not meet Pennsylvania’s “extreme and outrageous” standard.
- The implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing claim was dismissed because Pennsylvania does not recognize it as a separate cause of action in at-will employment.
- The ERISA fiduciary claim (Count I) was not addressed on the motion and remained pending.

## Legal Principles

- In Pennsylvania, at-will employment permits discharge with or without cause; any public-policy exception is narrowly limited to discharges that threaten a clear, articulated mandate of public policy grounded in constitutional or statutory provisions.
- The public-policy exception protects the public interest or fundamental rights, not generalized claims of unfairness in a private employment dispute.
- Negligent infliction of emotional distress is limited to specific Pennsylvania-recognized categories (including physical impact, zone of danger, contemporaneous observation of injury to a close relative, or a special duty relationship); ordinary termination-related allegations typically do not qualify.
- Intentional infliction of emotional distress requires conduct so extreme and outrageous as to exceed all bounds of decency; adverse employment actions, even if harsh, ordinarily do not satisfy this threshold.
- Pennsylvania does not permit an implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing claim to override the at-will doctrine or create a separate employment-based cause of action.

## Conclusion

The court held that Pennsylvania law, as applied in this case, did not recognize a wrongful discharge claim for an at-will employee terminated because she was a domestic-violence victim, and it dismissed related emotional-distress and implied-good-faith claims for failure to meet Pennsylvania’s strict legal standards, while leaving the ERISA claim for further litigation.


Green v. Bryant, 887 F. Supp. 798 (E.D. Pa. 1995)