Wilson v. State

John Wilson, a pharmacist at Western State Hospital, claimed that Hospital management wrongly removed him as director of the pharmacy department in retaliation for certain comments he made regarding personnel management. A jury agreed and awarded Wilson $9,000,000 for this violation of his constitutional right to free speech. We hold that the Hospital’s interest in proper personnel management outweighs the minor "public concern” content of Wilson’s comments. Accordingly, Wilson’s speech was not protected by the First Amendment and the trial court erred in submitting the free speech claim to…