Panel Orders Whistleblower Reinstated

NEW YORK (AP) - A tiny Virginia bank, at the heart of a closely watched case testing the nation's protection of corporate whistleblowers, must reinstate an executive it fired after he criticized accounting practices, a federal labor board has ruled.

The ruling by the Department of Labor's Administrative Review Board, is far from the final word in the long-running dispute between Cardinal Bankshares Corp. and David Welch, its former chief financial officer. But it is an important step, both for the two sides and for many companies that have followed the case closely.

The ruling, dated June 9 but not made public until late Tuesday, denies a request by Cardinal - a holding company for the Bank of Floyd in southwest Virginia - to stay a Labor Department judge's earlier order that it take Welch back.

In 2004, Welch became the first worker to win protection as a whistleblower under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, passed by Congress in 2002 after corporate scandals at Enron Corp., WorldCom Inc. and other companies. Cardinal has refused ever since to reinstate Welch.

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http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/invest-corp/2006/jun/13/061307234.html

hasn't been the same since the passing of poor Floyd.