Shelby Co. (ECWd) –
When a unit of government is sued, in this case, Shelby County, the attorney for the county has a duty to defend them. Is that what happened when Ed Flyn sued the county and the treasurer over unpaid invoices? The court ruled that the invoices must be paid in a Rule 23 ruling which means the case does not establish any case law and made it impossible for an appeal to the Supreme Court because they simply do not take Rule 23 cases. We covered numerous red flags in the ruling in this article.
The court-appointed attorney to represent the county at the time was Jasper County State’s Attorney Chad Miller. Miller is now a Judge.
Who knew that State’s Attorney Miller spent almost $225,000.00 in hiring private attorneys when the law gave no such power to an SA to hire private counsel? You can see all the billing, with the exception of 2 charges, all took place prior to the law being changed to allow an SA to hire private counsel by clicking here.
So the attorney appointed to defend the county over their hiring of a private attorney in violation of the law has himself had private counsel hired. Let that sink in.
What took place behind closed doors should concern everyone.
According to this letter, Miller claimed the “County” confessed the petition filed by Ed Flynn. When did that happen? There has been no “County Board” vote or discussion at all to indicate they confessed to anything. In fact, one of the board members was actually suing in his private capacity for a declaratory judgment on the matter since the law clearly was violated prior to January 1, 2019. He confirmed there was no agreement by the county to any such position. Miller goes on in his letter to claim the interests of Ed Flynn and the county remain the same and that he would do an excellent job representing the joint interests of the Shelby County Board and his firm at the appellate court level. Since when do a plaintiff and a defendant have the same interest? Why would Flynn be representing the county’s interest at the appellate court level?
What did Nichole Kroncke tell the county board in a closed session about this matter? Closed session minutes can be read at this link.
“Kroncke stated the County’s appointed counsel, Jasper County State’s Attorney Chad Miller, had aligned with Flynn and worked on the County’s behalf to get Mr. Flynn paid.” (emphasis added)
Since when is it proper for a client’s defense attorney to align with the plaintiff? Was the fact the attorney had done the same thing as a State’s Attorney that the county was being sued for part of the reason to “align” with the Plaintiff?
What did the court say when they ruled on this matter? ”
“The uncontroverted evidence in the record is that Ms. Vonderheide, as state’s attorney for the County, appointed Mr. Flynn to provide legal services in connection with labor negotiations on behalf of the County since 2014, which Ms. Vonderheide determined to be in the public interest.”
The justice system is broken when a patently false affidavit is relied upon and Rule 23 is used as the means of closing out the case. False affidavit because there was no appointment made by Vonderheide and the former Chairman Bruce Canon admitted the board’s hiring of him was wrong.
In our opinion, the key failures were the fact the false affidavit was uncontroverted and key facts were never presented as evidence into the record. Had the attorney defended the county board as required rather than “aligning” with the plaintiff, he would have seen the board hired Mr. Flyn, not the SA. He would have or should have, discovered the actual records prove the county board hired him, and the closed session recordings prove the board hired him and admitted it was wrong, to include Vonderheide saying she never approved the hiring. Never mind the fact there was no record anywhere to support the affidavit created by Ed Flyn for the State’s Attorney. Those failures are the result of a broken system.
If those matters are not disturbing enough, let’s not forget what Kroncke told the County Board in those closed session minutes.
“Kroncke also explained that former Labor Relations Attorney Ed Flynn would be “hired” as a special assistant solely for the purpose of finishing the contract, as he had litigated the contract and been involved with the arbitration process”.
In light of what the Forensic Auditor said about all the problems in the FOP contract, the question becomes, why hire the same guy who helped create those contracts filled with problems, according to the auditor? Is it because Macon County had done the same type of improper hiring of a private attorney for years?
Bill Kroncke, husband of former SA Nichole Kronke publicly stated to us on social media, “As far as problems go in Shelby County, they were here LONG before my wife took office.” Considering a select few continue to imply we are the problem, maybe those same people should listen to what one of their residents says.
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