BENTON – Brad Anderson, former North Marshall Water District Superintendent, following a seven-day trial that wrapped up last Wednesday, was awarded $74,600 in compensatory damages and $60,000 in punitive damages in a lawsuit originally filed in June 2012 claiming “wrongful termination, malicious prosecution, libel, slander and defamation” against former NMWD board members B.W. Darnell, Gary Clark, Robert Turner and Scott Solomon, former secretary and whistle-blower Paula Boling and NMWD customer Frank Futrell and Ray Langston, former owner of Clean Earth Recycling.
The jury found Bowling, Futrell and Langston responsible for compensatory damages while Turner, Solomon and the North Marshall Water District responsible for punitive damages with Solomon and Turner each responsible for $15,000 of the $60,000 punitive award.
In November 2014, a mistrial in the case was declared by Circuit Court Judge Dennis Foust as a result of “jury issues” in which reports were that a seated juror failed to disclose they had served as foreman on the grand jury that indicted Anderson in November 2010.
Anderson, in comments to Marshall County Daily at that time said, “I’ve waited four years to be able to face those who made these false allegations against me and once again I am unable to have that opportunity because of someone’s dishonesty.”
In a phone interview with Anderson’s attorney Stan Lee of Lexington, Lee said, “We feel totally vindicated”.
“Brad and I were delighted that he finally had an opportunity to tell his side of the story and the jury believed him”, Lee said. “They agreed and concluded that he was not a thief, he had not stolen that money and that what they did was knowingly and intentionally defamatory.”
According to Lee, awarding punitive damages are very rare in his 28 years of practice.
“Punitive virtually never happens due to the proof standards being so high, but the jury concluded they had been given enough to award it”, Lee said.
In October 2010, then board member Scott Solomon, accused Anderson of “financial mismanagement” and in April 2011, Anderson was terminated for “complaints of wrong doing” by the NMWD board in a 3-2 vote.
Secretary at the time, Paula Boling, was also put on a six month probation and two-week suspension at that time after working there for 18 years. Boling won her case for lost wages and punitive damages in August 2014 and was awarded $33,000.
This all began in mid-November 2010 when an anonymous complaint was received by the Kentucky State Police regarding the alleged misuse of funds by Anderson and on January 13, 2011, a grand jury handed down a single indictment for “theft by unlawful taking over $500”.
Lee said last week’s verdict proves the allegations against his client were trumped-up allegations, pettiness and vindictive.
“The most important thing in all of this is that the jury got to finally hear Brad’s side of the story and finally got to hear the truth”, Lee said.
No appeals have been filed at this time but Lee expects that they will in a case such as this.