Whoops! Teen’s Facebook brag sees dad’s $80,000 lawsuit settlement turn to dust

Poor ol’ Patrick Snay. He must have been overjoyed when he won an age discrimination case against his former employer, Gulliver Preparatory School in Miami. The settlement included an $80,000 award plus $10,000 in back pay.

However, the court ruled that the settlement would only stand on the condition that it remained a secret.

Too bad Mr. Snay, 69, failed to let his daughter know about this important element of the ruling. Or perhaps he did. Either way, Dana took to her Facebook page to inform one and all of her dad’s win, posting a message that will have most people throwing their head in their hands.

“Mama and Papa Snay won the case against Gulliver,” Dana wrote to her 1200 Facebook friends shortly after the settlement was reached. “Gulliver is now officially paying for my vacation to Europe this summer. SUCK IT.” Oh dear.

The school discovered Dana’s musings on the case and refused to pay the money, claiming the terms of the agreement had been violated. Mr. Snay went to court in a bid to have the ruling upheld, but last week the Third District Court of Appeal in Florida sided with the school and threw it out, the Miami Herald reported recently.

“Snay violated the agreement by doing exactly what he had promised not to do,” Judge Linda Ann Wells wrote in her ruling. “His daughter then did precisely what the confidentiality agreement was designed to prevent.” In other words, Snay shouldn’t even have told his daughter. And Dana most certainly shouldn’t have broadcast the news on Facebook.

According to the Herald, the confidentiality agreement included Mr. Snay and his wife, but not Dana. However, as you might expect, their daughter was aware of the case at the time, leaving her father to conclude that “we needed to tell her something.” Unfortunately, he omitted to tell her not to announce it on Facebook.

Snay is now considering whether to appeal the decision to the Florida Supreme Court. Presumably the European vacation is on hold.