§ 122.001.Protection of Jurors' Employment; Juror's Right to Reemployment; Notice of Intent to Return

One of two competing texts of this section, both enacted in 2019 and neither repealing the other.

This is the version amended by Senate Bill 370. The other, from House Bill 504, is narrower. The code prints both and directs the reader from each to the other; the Legislature never harmonised them.

An employer may not discharge, threaten to discharge, intimidate, or coerce any permanent employee because the employee serves as a juror, or for the employee’s attendance or scheduled attendance in connection with the service, in any court in the United States.

Four prohibited acts, and three of them stop short of dismissal. A threat, an act of intimidation, or coercion violates this text without anyone losing a job — which reaches the pressure an employee feels before the summons is answered.

"Any employer" is unqualified here, where the other text reaches a private employer.

"Attendance or scheduled attendance in connection with the service" is broader than serving. An employee penalised for reporting to a panel and being sent home is covered.

"In any court in the United States" covers federal and out-of-state service, so the protection is not confined to Texas juries.

This text speaks of a "juror" rather than "juror or grand juror", the phrase the other version and the rest of the chapter use.

Subsection (b) supplies the right to return to the same employment held when summoned, conditioned on giving the employer actual notice of the intent to return as soon as practical after release.

The condition is on the employee, and it is easy to miss. The right is not self-executing; without prompt actual notice it is not triggered.