TALLAHASSEE - A former employee is suing a university for whistleblower retaliation.
Darius Jefferson Sr. filed a lawsuit on Jan. 3 in Leon County Circuit Court against the Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University and the Board of Trustees for public whistleblower retaliation.
According to the lawsuit, in July 2017, Jefferson found himself subject to reprimand for not completing biosafety training. Jefferson ultimately did complete the training before the date of his certificate suspension, but the defendant deliberately failed to report his completion of the certification to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the suit claims.
Jefferson claims this was direct retaliation due to the vocal opposition a selective discipline of co-workers. In another incident, Jefferson confronted an officer who was openly carrying outside of his district who then threatened Jefferson with the possibility of arrest, the suit says. Jefferson later found out the man was impersonating an officer and contacted his supervisors but was told that he should know the officer's last name carried significant weight because of who his father is and nothing would be done, the suit claims.
Soon after the report was made, Jefferson began to notice his evaluation scores were abruptly declining, he says. Jefferson claims to have begun suffering from disciplinary actions that targeted his ability to seek promotion and inhibit the value of his recommendation for promotion.
In a final incident, Jefferson was terminated on a false allegation of stalking behavior, he says.
Jefferson was caused to suffer past and future weight losses, loss of benefits, loss of the capacity for the enjoyment of Life, emotional pain and suffering and other tangible and intangible damages.
Jefferson seeks equitable relief, general and compensatory damages and economic losses, damages for emotional pain, a judgment in joining defendant from future violations of the law, attorney fees and cost of suit. Jefferson is represented by Marie a. Mattox of Tallahassee.
Leon County Circuit Court case number 22-CA-000014