Pulaski County Circuit Judge Wendell Griffen must recuse from the discrimination lawsuit by a fired Little Rock sewer worker against the wastewater agency over his termination because the judge has shown he's prejudiced against white Christians like him and his client, the man's lawyer states in a recent motion.
Attorney Chris Corbitt called on the Black judge to disqualify himself on Friday, shortly after Griffen dismissed his client's 2½-year-old lawsuit against the Little Rock Water Reclamation Authority and its director, Greg Ramon. Corbitt argued that the judge, who's also a Baptist pastor, threw out the suit despite evidence showing client James Young, 59, of Maumelle was wrongly fired.
Griffen sided with the reclamation authority's lawyers, who had argued in a summary judgment motion that the suit should be dismissed because Young doesn't have the evidence to prove his claims of discrimination, retaliation and violation of state whistleblower protection laws.
Young filed suit in July 2018, claiming he had been fired after 4½ years with the agency because he's a native of Scotland who had been complaining about wasteful spending by the agency, the conduct of a supervisor he said was out to get him and the promotion of a co-worker who, Young claims, is incompetent.
As proof of the judge's bias against him and his client, Corbitt cites a post made Thursday on Griffen's blog, The Fierce Urgency of Prophetic Hope.
The lawyer says Griffen has concluded that white men cannot be discriminated against because "White Christians created a racist system whereby their supremacy in the world prevents a white man from suffering discrimination and any adverse actions because he is white."
"Griffen's broad and generally sweeping public statements constitutes prima facia evidence of his bias against white Christians and makes him unfit and unable to preside over this case because it involves discrimination against a white man," the motion states. "Griffen is emotional [sic] and intellectually compromised because of the political climate and should be disqualified in this case based on his published opinions of white Christians."
The blog post, titled "The Impotence of White Christianity," where Griffen wrote, among other things, "It's time for White Christian Americans to face the bitter truth people of color have known for centuries. White Christianity is not a force for truth, justice, peace or anything else we consider good."
Corbitt states that the post violates rule 2.11 of the Judicial Code of Conduct, which makes a judge subject to disqualification for public statements outside the scope of their duties that "commits or appears to commit the judge to reach a particular result or rule in a particular way in the proceeding or controversy."
"Judge Griffen's blog post commits or appears to commit himself to reaching a particular result; that result being that a white Christian man cannot be discriminated against, that white Christian men are racist, that a white Christian man is a clear and present danger to society," Corbitt states in his motion, which he amended Monday. "Judge Griffen's blog post commits himself to rule against white Christian people in his court room."
The motion further states that Griffen's writing shows that the judge has concluded that white Christians are "impotent ... a delivery system for white supremacy ... fierce opponents to desegregated education ... a clear and present danger through white nationalism to democracy, social justice and peace [and] are pernicious perpetrators and the primary transmitter of white supremacy of the world."
Simultaneously with his recusal motion, Corbitt filed an expanded version of the lawsuit, stating that he was entitled to update the lawsuit, despite Griffen's dismissal order, because the judge's findings have yet to be put in writing.
According to the expanded suit, Young worked for the sewer service twice, as a wastewater plant operator, once from 1986 through 1998, and then again from August 2013 until his March 2018 firing.
Young claims that his supervisor, Eric Wassell, spitefully denied him a promised pay increase in July 2017 after Young had complained that Wassell had subjected him to "harmful physical contact" in August 2013.
After receiving a bad performance review from Wassell in January 2018, Young took his complaints about Wassell, the decision to promote a coworker Young considered incompetent, Traci Kerr, and wasteful spending in the department to upper managers the following week in meeting with Ramon and agency executives.
About a month later, he was placed on paid administrative leave over an insubordination complaint by Wassell, which became the grounds for his firing, according to the suit. Kerr and Wassell are not parties to the suit.
Young called the insubordination allegation false, stating that he had been ordered to perform a job that could not have been reasonably completed during his shift. The reclamation authority fired him without following its own procedures and never gave Young the chance to contest the accusations against him, the lawsuit states.
Young, a U.S. citizen, has a "heavy" accent because of his national origin and further states that his last performance evaluation was "manipulated to make him look bad and paint [him] in a bad light to cover up" the real reason for his firing, discrimination based on national origin, the suit states.
A complaint by Young to the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission resulted in the agency providing a right-to-sue letter in April 2018, court filings show.