Fayette County Prison warden sues board members over suspension
The warden of the Fayette County Prison is suing the county and the members of the prison board who voted for his suspen-sion in January, claiming his support for the construc-tion of a new prison is what motivated the suspen-sion.
Brian Miller, represented by attorney Joel Sansone, filed the civil complaint in federal western district court, claiming Fayette County Commissioners Angela Zimmerlink and Vince Zapotosky, Sheriff Gary Brownfield and then-Acting Controller Jeanine Wrona all had personal political reasons for suspending him for three days without pay, and that they conspired with each other.
In the complaint, Miller alleges Zapotosky stood to gain personally and perhaps financially by Miller’s removal from the warden’s office.
“At the time of these events, Dr. Dominic Dileo was employed to serve as physician of Fayette County Prison,” Sansone wrote, adding that Zapotosky and Dileo are close personal friends.
“In his role as warden, (Miller) does not permit Dr. Dileo to prescribe methadone to inmates at the Fayette County Prison. Dr. Dileo is also the director of a methadone clinic located in Fayette County,” Sansone wrote.
“(Miller) believes … Zapotosky intended to remove (him) from his position as warden in part so that a favored deputy warden, Barry Croftchek, could assume the office, thereby allowing Fayette County Prison’s physician to prescribe methadone to prison inmates, thereby resulting in pecuniary gain to Dr. Dileo and/or defendant Zapotosky,” the attorney went on to allege.
Zapotosky, when contacted for comment, said he took great umbrage at the suggestion that he was doing anything other than looking out for the safety of inmates.
“I was looking at a protocol to treat inmates with addiction, so we don’t have inmates getting sick and taking their lives or hurting somebody else,” said Zapotosky. “We need to put measures in place to protect inmates.”
Dileo did not respond to a request for comment Monday.
Miller claims Brownfield’s vested interest in whether he retained his job as warden had to do with the sheriff’s son, who is a lieutenant at the prison, the suit states. “Brownfield intended to remove (Miller) from his position as warden in part so that defendant Brownfield’s son could assume the office,” Sansone stated.
Brownfield did not return a call for comment.
Miller contends Zimmerlink was aware of his participation in the volunteer prison working group, which met over 18 months to analyze the needs of the prison and establish a plan for addressing them. In the suit, Miller alleges Zimmerlink sought to have him removed from his position out of retaliation for his support of the new prison project that was developed by the working group.
The suit claims Wrona consistently voted in line with Zimmerlink, and that Wrona’s vote was motivated as much by Miller’s “political affiliation” with the prison working group as Zimmerlink’s.
When contacted Monday, Wrona said she had no comment on the suit and Zimmerlink did not respond to requests for comment.
According to the suit, in the month prior to his suspension, which was later found to be unjustified, Zimmerlink and Zapotosky removed Miller from a prison working group meeting to “discuss an unrelated matter.”
“After the conversation was concluded, defendant Zapotosky and/or defendant Zimmerlink told (Miller) that the new prison ‘would never be built,” Sansone wrote. “(Miller) then stated that he did not want to be part of defendants Zapotosky and Zimmerlink’s ‘political games.'”
Less than a week after that alleged conversation, two inmate assaults occurred in the county jail, one on Dec. 23 and another two days later. Miller was not on duty, the suit states, and in his stead, prison staff contacted Uniontown City Police to investigate the incidents, per prison policy.
On Jan. 8, Dominick Carnicella, then the director of human resources for the county, began an investigation into the assaults. Miller was notified that he was under investigation “for failure to comply with a Prison Board of Inspectors’ policy that mandated immediate notification to the board of any inmate assaults.”
At that time, Sansone contended, no such policy existed.
At a prison board meeting held four days later, Miller was ordered by Zapotosky to leave the meeting prior to the board’s vote on his punishment, Sansone wrote. “This order was against board policy, and prevented (Miller) from presenting his own defense.”
Zapotosky, Zimmerlink, Brownfield and Wrona voted to suspend Miller for three days without pay while the remaining members, Commissioner Al Ambrosini and District Attorney Jack R. Heneks Jr., voted against the suspension, the suit states.
On Feb. 25, Sansone wrote, Carcinella reported to the prison board that Miller had not only not committed any wrongdoing related to the inmate assaults, but also that no policy existed that mandated the immediate notification of the board by Miller or anyone else of such assaults.
On March 13, the suit states Wrona requested an independent investigation, which was conducted by the solicitor for the controller’s office, who concluded Miller did not commit any policy violations.
Sansone alleges that despite these findings, Zimmerlink announced at a campaign event hosted on March 24 by the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA), the labor union that represents the corrections officers at the prison, that the “warden and deputy warden need to be fired for the prison to run properly.”
That statement amounted to slander, the suit alleges.
On March 25, the prison board voted to reverse the disciplinary action against Miller, who did not receive his back pay for those three days until June, nor an expungement of the suspension from this record until July, the suit states.
Miller contends his First Amendment right to be free from retaliation based on political affiliation was violated by the four prison board members, as well as the county, which failed to train its employees to refrain from such alleged rights violations.
Because he enjoyed a right to property interest in his position as warden, protected under the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, Miller also sued all defendants for allegedly violating that right as well.