Decision issued in suit against water district

Clark County District Court Judge Donald Mosley on Monday issued his final decision in a wrongful termination lawsuit filed almost four years ago against the Las Vegas Valley Water District, ruling against the agency and ordering it to pay more than $1 million in attorneys fees, back pay and other expenses.

The decision, which has been anticipated since a hearing last Fall, clears the way for the district to appeal the case to the Nevada Supreme Court.

"We've been waiting for the opportunity to appeal for a year," the LVVWD's general counsel Charles Hauser said yesterday.

Hauser had not yet seen the decision, signed and filed late Monday afternoon, but he said he doubted if the judge had changed his mind since the earlier hearings in which Mosley was critical of the district's handling of the termination.

The LVVWD posted a $1 million appeals bond last year in anticipation of the final order and attorney Daniel Polsenberg was hired to handle the case.

Mosley said former district risk manager Jerry Matherly, accused by his employer of uttering racist and sexist comments over a period of years, was denied due process when he was fired in December 1994.

According to Mosley, Matherly received a letter of termination from a termination hearing officer that first was submitted to LVVWD attorney Greg Smith for review and approval.

Mosley had harsh words for the water district, including the district's supervisor, Patricia Mulroy.

The judge noted that the "administrative hierarchy have not only asserted the right to control, but have controlled, the conduct of the proceedings by which Matherly's property rights as a tenured governmental employee ... were to be affected."

Mosley said Mulroy, though disqualifying herself from Matherly's termination hearings, continued to control them through appointment of a hearing officer of her own choosing.

"There is no serious issue that Matherly has been anything but a good and conscientious employee, to whom no prior admonition concerning asserted racist, sexist or irreligious commends had ever been tendered," said Mosley.

Matherly has a $5 million civil suit pending against the district.

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