Adams’ Lawyer Warns of ‘Costly, Risky and Completely Unnecessary’ Lawsuit

June 7, 2022 by Amy Patterson

A lawyer representing Jim Adams, executive director of the Geauga County Board of Mental Health, warned the county could be facing a costly, risky and “completely unnecessary” legal battle if the board proceeds with terminating Adams.

In a May 19 letter to Geauga County Prosecutor Jim Flaiz, attorney Jack Moran, of the Cleveland firm McCarthy, Lebit, Crystal & Liffman Co., L.P.A., said the decision by the board to place Adams on administrative leave and offer him a three-month severance package has already caused damage.

“Given that a 35-year public servant is now being discussed in the press on administrative leave for ‘undisclosed’ reasons (when, in reality, those reasons are actually ‘nonexistent’), we cannot countenance the current status quo for long,” Moran said.

On June 2, Flaiz said he received Moran’s letter and forwarded it to the county’s insurance carrier, but was unable to comment further at this time.

Moran said the board has no reason to terminate Adams’ employment.

Adams has no immediate plans to leave the job and his performance has never given rise to any legitimate reason for termination, he said.

However, the board has in recent months developed an “obvious, but inexplicable, hostility to (Adams) continuing in his role,” Moran added.

The only written instance of disciplinary action on file in Adams’ employment record is one he received Nov. 17, 2021, when he was issued a formal reprimand from the board for authoring a book, published that same year, titled “Preventing, Intervening, and Recovering From School Shootings and Other Traumatic Events.”

Moran said the reprimand on file criticizes Adams for being “actively engaged in researching and writing the foregoing publication without notifying the entire board of (his) intentions to do so.”

A prior board meeting referenced in the reprimand showed no resolution was passed regarding the book, but that one board member said he thought Adams needed the board’s permission to write it.

“Even if such an instruction were legal, there actually was no action by the board to even instruct (Adams) to refrain from writing the book. The entire basis for the board’s reprimand was misguided and, frankly, incorrect,” Moran said.

Moran said he sees the board’s recent decision to place Adams on leave as the initial stage in what will ultimately be an involuntary termination of his employment, which would be unlawful on the basis of his constitutionally protected right to free speech.

As the board has placed a written reprimand in Adams’s file related to the book, Moran said, in cannot plausibly argue that his exercise of his right to free speech in writing it did not motivate a later decision to terminate him, no matter what reasons are raised after the fact.

Additionally, Moran said the board has made it clear it feels he is too old for his position. Board members demanded Adams provide a “succession plan” after a recent meeting.

“Obviously, if (Adams) were substantially younger, the board would not be asking about his ‘retirement’ plans,” Moran said. “This ongoing pressure has raised understandable suspicion that Adams’ age is influencing how he is being perceived — in addition to the board’s hostility to the book.”

Adams, 64, is in a protected employment class under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, which prohibits employment discrimination against persons 40 years of age or older, and would have “exceedingly strong claims” under the Ohio Revised Code to show age-related discrimination, Moran said.

If Adams were to pursue a lawsuit against the board, the board would be required to provide a legitimate, nondiscriminatory and nonretaliatory reason for terminating his 35-year employment, he said, adding, however, the board faces an uphill battle proving its reasoning, since it already committed to writing, less than a year ago, that Adams’ employment was already in jeopardy based on his book.

Thus, the board will be challenged to overcome evidence that Adams’ firing was already in motion before the board had legitimate reasons for termination, Moran said.

“While we suspect that some members of the board believe that they can simply hire an investigator to engineer an after-the-fact rationalization for Adams’ removal, the law is clear that such ‘post hoc creation[s]’ (are seen) as mere ‘litigation strategy’ that a jury can reject,” he said.

Moran suggested an early, private mediation within 30 days of his letter to avoid the risk of a formal lawsuit.

Adams’ claims would allow him to recover back pay, front pay, noneconomic compensatory damages, punitive damages, liquidated damages (doubling his back pay award), and attorneys’ fees, creating steep risk for the board, he said.

“Terminating Adams’s employment will hand him perhaps one of the most straightforward First Amendment retaliation claims that this office has ever seen,” Moran said.