Curtis Douglas vs. Veterans Administration (5 Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB), 313 (1981) was a case decided by the Merit Systems Protection Board which established criteria that supervisors must consider in determining an appropriate penalty to impose for an act of federal employee misconduct.
[5] Initially, the MSPB's presiding officials sided with the employers on the grounds that selection of a penalty was a matter of agency discretion.
However, the MSPB reopened the case, and requested comments via the Federal Register as to whether 1) the preponderance of the evidence standard was the appropriate standard to determine whether an agency-imposed sanction should be sustained, and 2) whether the MSPB had the authority to modify a punishment if it determined "the penalty does not promote the efficiency of the service".
In its opinion the MSPB made the following determinations: The Douglas factors are critical to a determination of the disciplinary penalty to be issued in a federal employee's case and are used to argue that disciplinary charges for federal employees, even if true, should still result in a lower penalty than the one proposed.
[8] Moreover, the MSPB has consistently held that when deciding officials fail to fully consider all the relevant Douglas Factors their penalty determination is not entitled to deference.