Sarbanes Oxley’s creation of a new category of federal whistleblowers is now more than 10 years old, and Dodd-Frank’s expansion of those rights is going on four years, but the rights of individuals to bring whistleblower claims, the appropriate standards of proof, and how employers may defend these claims, continue to bedevil litigants and the courts.
The year 2014 is likely to be a watershed one for resolving a number of these key issues. In its first SOX whistleblower case, the U.S. Supreme Court will clarify whether all contractors and subcontractors of publicly traded companies are covered by SOX—rendering the employees of all these entities potential whistleblowers.
