Ex-Michaels worker says job cut after ADA accommodation

A former Michaels employee says the arts-and-crafts retailer eliminated her job on June 27, 2025, the day after her 90-day work-from-home accommodation under the Americans with Disabilities Act ended.

Leah Gormly, who worked on the company’s eCommerce Content team, sued The Michaels Companies Inc. on December 29, 2025, in the 134th Judicial District Court of Dallas County. Michaels moved the case to federal court in Dallas in May, court documents obtained by Urgent Matter show.

Michaels admits in its answer that Gormly’s employment ended that day “when her position was eliminated.” The company denies her claims and says it acted in good faith.

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Gormly says she was “granted an allowance under the ADA to work from home for 90 days” and had an appointment on June 30, 2025, to finalize a second 90-day extension. At a meeting on June 27, she was told her job was gone.

Her lawsuit includes claims of disability and age discrimination and unpaid overtime. She says she was the “oldest woman on the eCommerce Content team” and by June 2025 regularly worked 55 hours a week.

She also brings claims under state law for breach of contract, fraudulent inducement, defamation and violations of the company handbook.

Paid subscribers can read the court documents used in this reporting.

Court Docs: Ex-Michaels worker job cut claims

Court documents filed by Michaels in Gormly’s federal employment lawsuit in Dallas.

Urgent MatterAdam Schrader

Gormly says she started on the content team in April 2017, handling product images for the company’s website. Michaels denies she joined the team that month.

Most of the lawsuit centers on a senior manager on the team identified only as J.M. Gormly says J.M. criticized and bullied her for years. She raised it with her manager at the time but did not take it to human resources.

Michaels admits in its answer that Gormly “encountered interpersonal issues with J.M.” The company denies it allowed harassment or bullying.

The dispute came to a head in March 2025 over a vendor image request. Michaels admits J.M. wrote to Gormly on Microsoft Teams on March 18.

“Why are you changing assigned that had my name to yours?!?!” the message said.

A day later, J.M. told Gormly “moving forward, do not change my name from anything…or anyone else’s unless you tell them at that moment,” Michaels’ answer shows.

Gormly began seeing a therapist and on March 25, 2025, gave the company a letter from the therapist recommending she work from home. She met with human resources manager Lindsey Wakely, received the 90-day accommodation, and Michaels opened an investigation into J.M.

Michaels told Gormly the results on May 5, 2025, during a monthly check-in with her manager. She says the investigation blamed both her and J.M. for their problems.

Gormly says the company “arbitrarily limited the facts and timeframe” and that its findings “defied logic, violated handbook rules, and appear[ed] to have violated certain laws.”

She says her workload grew since May 2024, when the company let go of two other content team employees, leaving her with work once handled by three people. Michaels admits the two were separated then but denies anything unlawful.

Gormly also complains about Michaels’ headquarters at 3939 W. John Carpenter Freeway in Irving, Texas, where employees returned in 2022 after working remotely during the pandemic. She blames the building’s air for eye, sinus and lung irritation, headaches and breathing problems and says she believed employees had “sick building syndrome.”

She raised the building in comments on Michaels’ annual employee engagement survey in May 2025. She says the company called the survey confidential but later learned who wrote the comments.

Michaels admits it received a survey response from an unidentified employee who asked whether Legionella bacteria was in the building.

Michaels also admits that a Black woman on the content team, identified as C.P., lost her job on or about the same day as Gormly. The company denies that her separation was unlawful.

Gormly turned down a separation agreement and release Michaels offered her. She says she was later prescribed medication for anxiety and depression and could not continue therapy because her insurance ended with her job.

In its partial motion to dismiss, Michaels asked a federal judge to dismiss all of Gormly’s state-law claims and bar her from refiling them. The company says the lawsuit tries to turn “a wide-ranging collection of workplace grievances” into legal claims.

“Michaels says employee handbooks are not contracts under Texas law unless they show the company meant to be bound. It also says Texas does not recognize several of the claims Gormly brings, including ones she calls “manipulating and lying to employees’ and ‘enabling and supporting defamation.”

Gormly’s claim for “tampering with potential witnesses” rests on the company seeking a meeting with another laid-off employee after her job was eliminated. Gormly says the purpose was to “gaslight, tamper with potential witnesses, [and] gather ‘intelligence.’”

“Speculation about why an employer wanted to speak with a former employee is not witness tampering,” Michaels’ lawyers wrote.

Michaels says any injury from the building falls under Texas workers’ compensation law, and that federal workplace safety law does not let employees sue their employers.

The company also says Gormly sued the wrong entity. Michaels said the Michaels Companies “is a holding company and has no employees,” and that her employer was Michaels Stores Inc.

The case had stalled in state court. Before Gormly served Michaels on April 16, 2026, the state judge set the case for dismissal three times for lack of action.

Gormly filed an amended complaint and moved to return the case to state court on October 2.

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