Employee Was Wrongfully Terminated After Failing Polygraph Test

McDoniel v. Kavry Mgmt., LLC, 114 Cal. App. 5^th 949 (2025)

Steven McDoniel was employed by Kavry Management as an "assistant grower" at its licensed marijuana growing facility in Adelanto, California. After $70,000 in cash and marijuana were stolen from the storage room, employees were told, "Y'all need to go take a polygraph test." The polygrapher, Rachel Levy, claimed she would not have conducted the polygraph exams unless each employee had signed a preprinted consent form that she had previously provided to Kavry. (Kavry was unable to produce at trial any of the consent forms purportedly signed by its employees, including McDoniel.) McDoniel failed the polygraph exam twice, which caused him to be "shocked beyond belief," "scared" and "worried that the career he had planned in the marijuana-cultivation industry would be over." After McDoniel was terminated, he did some research and concluded he should have been advised of his right to refuse to take the