Federal Supervisor's Harassment Report Was Within Scope of Employment, Shielding Her from Defamation Suit by Contractor Employee

The underlying dispute centers on a Valentine's Day encounter at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in Bethesda, Maryland. Mykola Yuzhakov, a Research Laboratory Veterinary Technician employed by federal contractor Charles River Laboratories, went to the office of Dr. Julie A. Holdridge Nichols — a NIAID Facility Veterinarian who held supervisory authority over CRL staff — and gave her a box of chocolates and a bottle of wine. Nichols then emailed two CRL managers and an NIH contracting officer's representative reporting that Yuzhakov had shut her office door, come around to her side of the desk, presented the gifts, and made a comment about her looking good for her age. NIAID subsequently asked CRL to remove Yuzhakov from the contract, and CRL terminated him on or about February 20, 2025. Yuzhakov filed suit in Montgomery County state court alleging that Nichols's report was false and cost him his job. Yuzhakov, for his part, contends that Nichols had subjected him to unwanted advances throughout his employment and that her complaint was vindictive retaliation after he rejected her.

Judge Theodore D. Chuang of the District of Maryland applied Maryland's scope-of-employment test, which asks whether the conduct was in furtherance of the employer's business, was authorized, occurred within the authorized time and place of employment, and was motivated at least in part by a purpose to serve the employer. The court found that Nichols's report satisfied each element: it was sent at work, addressed to two CRL managers and the NIH contracting officer's representative, and was fairly construed as serving NIH's interest in addressing inappropriate workplace conduct within its facilities. The court analogized the report to an employee making a harassment complaint to a supervisor and the Human Resources Department, concluding that such a complaint falls comfortably within the scope of Nichols's employment.

The court rejected Yuzhakov's argument that personal animus took the report outside the scope of employment, noting that under Fourth Circuit precedent, even intentional torts remain within the scope of employment if they were a foreseeable aspect of employment and were motivated at least in part by a purpose to serve the employer. A workplace harassment complaint, the court reasoned, is an entirely foreseeable event in the course of a federal worker's employment. The court also found that Nichols's routing of the complaint to the COR and the NIH Human Resources Department rather than to CRL facility management — which Yuzhakov characterized as a procedural irregularity evidencing bad faith — did not undermine the scope-of-employment conclusion.

The court also addressed the validity of the government's Westfall Act certification. The initial certification was signed by Thomas F. Corcoran, Chief of the Civil Division of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Maryland, acting under authority delegated by United States Attorney Kelly O. Hayes. The court held the delegation permissible and, in any event, found the question moot because Hayes herself signed an updated certification dated November 21, 2025. The court further held, consistent with the Supreme Court's decision in Osborn v. Haley, that a district court has no authority to remand a Westfall Act case to state court on the ground that the certification was unwarranted — the proper remedy for an incorrect certification is to undo substitution and restore the individual defendant, not to return the case to state court.

The opinion also carried a warning for Yuzhakov, who is self-represented. The court noted in a footnote that many of the cases he cited and quoted either do not exist, do not contain the quoted language, or stand for the opposite proposition, and warned that future filings must contain accurate legal citations or may result in sanctions under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 11.