Soo and Jin Chung, the drycleaners who were sued for $67 million, can take some solace from the fact that former judge Roy Pearson is out of a job.

From Law.com:

‘Pants Judge’ Loses Wrongful Termination Appeal

Former administrative law judge Roy Pearson Jr. just can’t catch a break in his quest to hold someone accountable for losing his job with the District of Columbia.

Pearson, recall, was the judge who filed a multimillion-dollar suit against a dry cleaner over a lost pair of pants. The suit didn’t go unnoticed. In 2007, Pearson was denied reappointment to his post as a D.C. administrative law judge. Pearson sued, making a host of claims.

When Pearson’s wrongful termination suit was dismissed by the federal district court in Washington, he turned to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Thursday, a three-judge panel upheld the dismissal of the suit . . . .

“The district court correctly concluded Pearson’s testimony before the D.C. Council and private communication with the Council’s staff were not protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States,” D.C. Circuit Judges Douglas Ginsburg, Karen LeCraft Henderson and Merrick Garland said in a two-page judgment Thursday.

The judges pointed to a D.C. Circuit ruling last year in an unrelated case where the court said that a public employee speaks without First Amendment protection when he reports conduct that interferes with his job responsibilities. “Pearson did just that,” the panel judges said Thursday.

Pearson’s suit against his dry cleaner was also not protected speech, the appeals court said. “That suit did not involve a matter of public concern; as the district court stated, it was more properly ‘characterized as a personal vendetta against a dry cleaners over a pair of pants.’”