Louisiana Captain Challenges Termination

A Louisiana fire captain who was terminated last year, has filed suit claiming he is being retaliated against for contacting elected officials in his capacity as a union representative, in violation of his First Amendment rights. Jonathan Gramm filed suit in US District Court for the Western District of Louisiana naming the DeSoto Parish Fire District 9 and Fire Chief Kristopher King as defendants.

Gramm, who also serves as secretary-treasurer for IAFF Local 5138, helped organize the local in 2017. His current problem began when he telephoned members of the fire district’s Board of Commissioners. As explained in the complaint:

• On September 18, 2023, Gramm, along with other fire fighters employed by the District, learned that the upcoming Board of Commissioners meeting agenda included an item to approve public funds to be spent on a new vehicle for the Fire Chief.
• Local 5138 membership met to formulate a response to the Board of Commissioners to voice the fire fighters’ concern for public funds being spent on a new vehicle for the Fire Chief rather than being spent to improve the poor working conditions and equipment at Fire District 9. The fire fighters decided that Gramm, as their Union representative, would contact members of the Board of Commissioners to petition the use of the District’s resources appropriately towards the much-needed improvements for the fire fighters’ equipment and fire stations rather than use these funds to buy a new vehicle for Fire Chief King.
• On September 18, 2023, Gramm—while off duty—telephoned Commissioners Ross Tilbury and Bobby Ettredge to petition them, as his government officials, to redress his and other the District’s fire fighters’ concerns about the District and the expenditure of public funds.
• Gramm explained that he and the other fire fighters believed it is inappropriate for the Board to spend public money on a new vehicle for the Fire Chief while the District’s stations and equipment were in serious need of improvement. Gramm also explained that the Local 5138 membership believed that the money would be better spent improving Fire District 9’s stations and fire fighting equipment, as that would better ensure their safety, as well as that of the DeSoto Parish community.
• Gramm asked for their equipment and fire station issues be heard at the upcoming Fire District 9 Board of Commissioners meeting.
• The Commissioners that Gramm spoke to were receptive to his concerns, and he asked by Commissioner Ettredge to bring further concerns and issues to him.
• Upon arriving at work the next day, Fire Chief King called Gramm into his office and handed him a notice of formal investigation for an “incident involving him on or around September 18, 2023.”
•  This incident was clearly the protected constitutional activity Gramm engaged in the day before with the Commissioners while off-duty in his capacities as a union officer and private citizen.
• After this meeting, Gramm was sent home and placed on administrative leave.
• While on administrative leave, Gramm was subject to an investigation personally spearheaded by Fire Chief King that lacked due process.
• On November 27, 2023, Defendants terminated Gramm’s employment. Gramm was provided with an official notice of disciplinary action that stated Gramm “acted in an unbecoming, discourteous, deliberate, and unprovoked manner” when he “bypassed [his] supervisory, defamed the Fire Chief Kristopher King and made false statements and accusations of [sic] the misuse of department funds and a lack of appropriated equipment, to a member of the DeSoto Parish Fire District 9 Board of Commissioners outside of a Board of Commissioner’s open meeting. Your conduct was prejudicial to good order and demonstrated a lack of good moral character towards a fellow employee of DeSoto Parish Fire District 9.”
• Through this notice of disciplinary action, Defendants explicitly acknowledge that Gramm was terminated for petitioning his government officials to redress grievances in his capacity as a union officer while off-duty and for speaking to them as a private citizen about matters of public concern.

The complaint alleges 42 U.S.C. § 1983 violations for free speech, freedom of association, and right to petition government for a redress of grievances under the First and Fourteenth Amendments; and retaliation under Louisiana’s collective bargaining laws that guarantee employees will be “free from the interference, restraint, or coercion of employers of labor, or their agents, in the designation of such representatives or in self-organization or in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection.”

Here is a copy of the complaint: