A 911 dispatcher is suing the city of Salem and her supervisor, alleging that she was denied a promotion after department leaders refused to reschedule an exam so she could testify against her accused rapist in court.
Her lawsuit alleges that after she raised concerns with coworkers, the director of the Willamette Valley Communications Center, Scott Leavell, called her into a meeting intended to intimidate her. Leavell is a defendant in the suit.
The lawsuit, filed in Marion County Circuit Court on Dec. 21, seeks $1 million in damages including loss of future income, benefits and emotional distress.
City spokeswoman Courtney Knox Busch said the city would not comment on pending litigation.
According to the lawsuit, the dispatcher was hired in 2018 and applied for a promotion in August 2023. Two months later, her employer informed her she was scheduled for an interview and written exam on Nov. 9. She was already scheduled to testify during her abuser’s criminal trial in Multnomah County that week, according to the lawsuit.
The victim is named in public court documents, but Salem Reporter does not identify victims of sexual assault.
She said in her lawsuit that she requested a different interview and exam date that did not conflict with the trial, which was refused. Supervisors told her she could do the exam, which takes several hours, starting at 7 a.m. the day of the trial.
“The city’s agents told (the woman), ‘You would be late, but you could still attend,’ according to the lawsuit. She alleged they then told her that she could “keep her hat in the ring in case her trial was moved to a different date like it had been prior,” and that her expectations for a different test date were “unrealistic.”
The next day, on Oct. 11, she sent the supervisors and Leavell an email reiterating that she was a victim of a crime and asking again if they’d move the testing date. Leavell responded to inform her the test was canceled, according to the lawsuit.
It is illegal under state law for an employer to deny leave or to fire, intimidate or coerce a crime victim because they took leave for a case.
The dispatcher told her co-workers and people not employed by Salem about her trial not being accommodated, which prompted a required meeting on Dec. 12 with Leavell, Greg Hadley, assistant fire chief, and a union representative.
The dispatcher alleged they retaliated against her for telling people that her trial was not accommodated, which was protected speech.
In an audio recording of the meeting obtained by Salem Reporter, Hadley questioned the truth of the dispatcher’s claims that she wasn’t accommodated, saying that “there were three people in that room, two came out with a consistent message.”
He said misinformation about what happened “spread like wildfire” and they had to cancel the test “because everybody else dropped out.” He referred to the situation several times as character assassination, and said the city might take action if it continued.
”We can’t step on concerted activity, we can’t step on freedom of speech, but what we can say is if it’s malicious, if it’s not factual and it’s not truthful we do have the opportunity to go a different direction,” he said at the meeting. “We don’t want to go there.”
Hadley said that the victim was offered chances to take the test the day of the trial, which she replied would have made her miss or have been late to the trial.
During the meeting, she told supervisors she believed her employer broke the law by not accommodating her trial.
“There were accommodations offered. They weren’t accommodations to your satisfaction, but they were offered,” Hadley said.
She said that her coworkers were not upset because of a misunderstanding.
“I am a victim of a rape that has been four years in the making and my trial is not being accommodated. That is the basis of it. Forget ‘he said, she said.’ That is the issue. That is what people are mad about.”
Her attorney, Sean Riddell, said she was still working for the city as of Friday, Dec. 29. The lawsuit states she’s paid $35.66 an hour, and the promotion she sought would have raised her wage to $39.70.
Her assailant pleaded guilty on Nov. 3 to second-degree sexual abuse and was sentenced to three years of supervised probation.
Contact reporter Abbey McDonald: [email protected] or 503-575-1251.
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Abbey McDonald joined the Salem Reporter in 2022. She previously worked as the business reporter at The Astorian, where she covered labor issues, health care and social services. A University of Oregon grad, she has also reported for the Malheur Enterprise, The News-Review and Willamette Week.
