The opportunity to seek justice has been a long time coming for whistleblower Helen Armstrong.
Over eight long years, she survived cancer, a heart stent transplant, the loss of a job she held for more than two decades, and the immense pressure of fighting an uphill legal battle.
Thanks to Thursday’s ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the former Las Vegas medical-office supervisor will at last get the chance to have her case heard.
In a unanimous decision by a three-judge panel, the federal appeals court restored most of Armstrong’s lawsuit against four Nevada Occupational Safety and Health Administration (NOSHA) officials, whom she accused of exposing her identity as a whistleblower and conspiring with her employer to derail her workplace retaliation complaint after she was fired.
Armstrong filed a lawsuit in 2017 naming former NOSHA Director and current Director of the Department of Business and Industry Terry Reynolds, former NOSHA Chief Administrator Jess Lankford, and NOSHA Chief Investigator Lara Pellegrini. The lawsuit was dismissed in 2020 after a determination that Armstrong’s 23-year at-will employee status at Ear Nose and Throat Associates was not constitutionally protected.
The appeals court disagreed, paving the way for the case to be refiled in U.S. District Court. Following this week’s development, a spokesman for the state attorney general said the office was “evaluating the decision and determining any next steps.”
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