By: Loyd Willaford and Clive Pontusson
In Smith v. Town of Bridgewater, a Federal District Court in Massachusetts dismissed the claim of a Special Police Officer, employed on a one-year contract, that his due process rights had been violated. The court found that the Officer only had a reasonable expectation of employment for the term of his contract. The Town decided not to re-hire him outside of that contract, and therefore that decision did not violate the Officer’s due process right to a termination hearing.
Officer Smith had been a Police Officer in Bridgewater for many years. Following his retirement in 2002 he was hired as a “Special Police Officer” with more limited duties. The Town of Bridgewater hires several such Officers each year on one-year employment contracts. In 2015, another officer complained to Officer Smith that despite the fact a Town Selectman (equivalent to a town or city council member) had numerous driving violations, a Sargent had told him to release the Selectman and not enter the stops into the logbook. Smith investigated this matter and ran the Selectman’s license plates to ensure his registration was current. When the Sargent found out about this, he called Smith into his office and an argument ensued. Smith was suspended for 45 days for insubordination, and then returned to duty. But the following year, Smith was not reappointed as a Special Police Officer. The reason the Police Chief gave was Smith’s insubordination issues.
Smith claimed he had a property interest his job, and that the Department denied him his Constitutional right to due process before taking that job away. Specifically, Smith pointed to a state law that said employees can only be removed for cause and with a hearing. Smith alleged that members of the department had broken state laws by retaliating against him for his concerns about their own unlawful conduct.
The Town of Bridgewater argued that Smith had been suspended and then not re-appointed for refusal to follow orders and directives. The Town claimed that there were clear instructions that Special Police Officers were not to run license registration searches, and that by doing so Smith was exceeding his authority. Finally, the Town argued that the Police Chief’s concern about Smith’s forceful attitudes, and the effect that was having on younger officers, were good reasons to not re-appoint him the following year.
The Court rejected Smith’s argument that his rights to due process had been violated. The Court began by explaining what would have triggered Smith’s due process rights in the first place:
In the specific instance of termination from state employment, to maintain a procedural-due-process claim, a public employee must first demonstrate that he has a reasonable expectation, arising out of a statute, policy, rule, or contract, that he will continue to be employed.
Smith did indeed point to a state law that said state employees can only be removed during their employment for cause, and after a hearing. But as the Court saw it, Smith’s claim failed because of the “during their employment” part of that law. When Smith’s one-year contract ended, he no longer had an expectation of employment, and so his due process rights were not harmed. The Court said,
Even if he had received a hearing and defendants had not been able to provide cause for terminating him, Smith was entitled, at most, to employment through the end of his annual contract.
This case illustrates the importance of properly pleading claims. Here the officer did not make a federal claim for a violation of his First Amendment rights to object to unlawful behavior. The officer merely claimed that his rights to due process were violated when his contract was not renewed. But there was no right to automatic renewal of the contract. This fact made it easy for the Court to dismiss the officer’s only federal claim. Presumably, the officer’s more substantive claims of whistleblowing will be heard in State Court where the Court sent the officer’s remaining claims.
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