Judge dismisses case against Bellingham over COVID-19 vaccine mandate firings
A Whatcom County Superior Court judge has dismissed a lawsuit against the city of Bellingham and its police department for allegedly failing to accommodate two police officers who sought religious exemptions from the COVID-19 vaccine requirement.
Judge Lee Grochmal’s decision on the case — brought by former Bellingham Police Department officers Michael Scanlon and Jonathan Weiss in 2022 — was published Tuesday.
Scanlon and Weiss were fired from BPD in late 2021 after the department approved their requests for religious exemptions to the COVID-19 vaccine mandate but allegedly denied them reasonable accommodations to continue to work there while unvaccinated.
Scanlon and Weiss claimed that this denial was discriminatory and violated the 1964 Civil Rights Act. They requested a judgment stating that the denial of the reasonable accommodation requests violated the law, compensation for lost wages and monetary damages in an amount determined at trial.
The city of Bellingham submitted a motion for summary judgment to dismiss the case in December, and a hearing was held Jan. 29. At the hearing, attorneys for the city and the plaintiffs provided arguments to Grochmal as to why the case should continue or be dismissed.
Arguments made
Harold Franklin, who represents Scanlon and Weiss, laid out what he saw as accommodations that could have been made for the plaintiffs to allow them to continue working. These included masking, social distancing and regular testing — procedures he argued were in place for vaccinated employees who had breakthrough infections.
He also said the city used the wrong standard to evaluate reasonable accommodations, and that discussions with human resources weren’t “interactive.”
Shannon Phillips, an attorney for the city of Bellingham, argued that as police officers, Scanlon and Weiss had jobs that involved interacting with the public at a time when the county had high COVID-19 transmission rates.
These interactions often led to people “involuntarily” being in close contact with officers, Phillips said. She added that many of these individuals — such as those struggling with addiction, homelessness or mental health issues — in regular contact with law enforcement had higher rates of comorbidities.
She argued that keeping Scanlon and Weiss employed would create an undue hardship, which exempts employers from needing to provide reasonable accommodations.
In her ruling, Grochmal said she considered all the evidence presented to her. She decided to dismiss the case with prejudice, meaning that it cannot be refiled. As of Thursday afternoon, the plaintiffs had not appealed the ruling.
This story was originally published March 26, 2026 at 2:52 PM with the headline "Judge dismisses case against Bellingham over COVID-19 vaccine mandate firings."