Suit Against Sheriff Dismissed Former Captain For Pierce Clegg Claimed He Was Wrongfully Fired

A lawsuit filed against the Kootenai County sheriff by one of his former captains has been thrown out of court.

A U.S. District Court judge dismissed Tom Dickson’s case against Sheriff Pierce Clegg last week.

Dickson, a former friend and captain for the sheriff, sued Clegg and the county, claiming he had been wrongfully fired from his job.

“I’m ecstatic,” Clegg said Tuesday after hearing the court had ruled in his favor. “The bottom line is, had Mr. Dickson followed the rules of the sheriff’s department and Kootenai County, he’d still be working. When he doesn’t follow those rules, friendship doesn’t interfere.”

Dickson sued the sheriff’s department after Clegg fired him in 1994. At the time, Dickson was a captain in charge of managing the county jail. He had been with the department since 1989.

Dickson had been chairman of the criminal justice program at Seattle’s Shoreline Community College in 1988 when Clegg was first running for office. He said Clegg offered to give him a job if he was elected. Clegg won and Dickson took the job.

Dickson says Clegg promised him a job for as long as he was in office. But he claims Clegg suddenly fired him in 1994 and refused to give him any reason for the dismissal.

But on Tuesday, Clegg said he fired the former captain because of several incidents of poor behavior and his refusal to follow orders.

According to court documents, Dickson was investigated for taking meat from the jail that was supposed to be used to feed inmates.

Clegg also believed Dickson had used his county vehicle to go on a hunting trip and had allowed his then-girlfriend to use a shower inside the jail.

But Lawrence Beck, Dickson’s attorney, believes the sheriff is scrambling to come up with excuses for the firing.

“The sheriff believed that he didn’t need a reason to fire Tom so he just fired him,” Beck said. “Later, when it became perhaps apparent that he did need some reason to fire Tom, then reasons started to appear.”

Beck believes his client was given a verbal contract by the sheriff to be a deputy as long as Clegg was in office. When Clegg fired him, the sheriff wrongly broke the contract, Beck contends.

But Judge Mikel H. Williams decided that the county could not be bound by such a verbal contract given by the sheriff and dismissed the lawsuit.

And county attorney Dennis Molenaar said Tuesday that just because a person is given a job, does not mean they get to keep that job no matter how they behave while on duty.

Beck said he and Dickson are considering whether to appeal the case.

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