Effingham County’s Motion to Dismiss FOIA case denied.

Effingham Co. (ECWd) –

We sued the County of Effingham for failure to provide key financial records related to the payment of a private attorney to handle the County Ambulance contract.  We covered that flawed hiring process in this article.  Flawed because the court directed the appointment of an Assistant States Attorney to represent the county and the fact pattern is pointing to that not actually happening.

During the hearing for the Motion to Dismiss, State’s Attorney Brian Kibler stated that the payments made were to a private attorney contracted by the insurance company.  If that is true, then the court’s order for the person to be an Assistant State’s Attorney was not followed.

The Court ruled that the County has until October 10th, 2018 to file their ANSWER to our Amended Complaint.

PLAINTIFF BY ATTORNEY BURDAY; DEFENDANT COUNTY OF EFFINGHAM BY SA KIBLER. ARGUMENTS PRESENTED REGARDING DEFENDANT’S COMBINED MOTION TO DISMISS (FILED ON 5/11/18). MATTER TAKEN UNDER ADVISEMENT. THIS MATTER HAVING COME BEFORE THE COURT ON 9/11/18 FOR HEARING ON DEFENDANT COUNTY OF EFFINGHAM’S COMBINED MOTION TO DISMISS (FILED ON 5/11/18), AND THE COURT HAVING TAKEN THE MATTER UNDER ADVISEMENT, THE COURT NOW RULES AS FOLLOWS: (A) DEFENDANT’S 2-619 MOTION TO DISMISS IS DENIED, WITHOUT PREJUDICE TO DEFENDANT’S RAISING SAID ISSUES IN ANY ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSE, OR MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT; (B) DEFENDANT’S 2-615 MOTION TO DISMISS IS DENIED; (C) DEFENDANT SHALL FILE ITS ANSWER TO THE PLAINTIFF’S AMENDED COMPLAINT WITHIN 30 DAYS (ON OR BEFORE 10/10/18). CLERK TO SEND A COPY OF THIS DOCKET ENTRY ORDER TO BOTH COUNSEL OF RECORD.

We are confident that sooner or later we will obtain the total of the actual payments made to the private attorney. To date, we only have invoices submitted that included divorce matters which had nothing to do with county business pertaining to the ambulance contract.

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