By DAMIEN FISHER, InDepthNH.org
The former Corrections Officer fired after she alerted superiors about dangerously low staffing levels inside the Concord prison is a step closer to possibly getting her job back.
The New Hampshire Supreme Court on Wednesday overturned the 2024 Personnel Appeals Board decision in Claudia Cass’s termination appeal, ruling that the Board erred by not considering whistleblower laws in its decision.
Cass has been fighting her termination for years, saying she was punished for sticking up for the safety of inmates and her fellow officers. In December of 2022, Cass sent an email to her superiors, including Warden Michelle Edmark, about the low staffing levels she strongly felt put people in danger.
For her efforts, Cass was suspended, investigated, forced to undergo a psychological examination, and then fired.
The PAB twice denied her termination appeal partly on the grounds that it legally did not have the authority to deal with whistleblower law violations. But the Court ruled Wednesday the law is clear, and the PAB is wrong. Under the laws governing the Board, it must overturn any termination decision if it finds that the employing agency violated a law, including New Hampshire’s whistleblower protection laws.
“Contrary to its conclusion that it lacked jurisdiction to make such determinations, the PAB had authority and was therefore required to consider whether the personnel action on appeal violated those statutes for the limited purpose of determining whether to reinstate an employee,” Chief Justice Gordon MacDonald wrote.
When the PAB first ruled against Cass in 2024, it was not a unanimous decision. Former Chair Jason Majors dissented, writing he would have voted to reinstate Cass since she “never actually refused to follow an order from her superiors while on duty.” Majors also thought at the time that Cass’s firing was possibly a violation of the state’s whistleblower law, but wrote she would need to file a lawsuit in order to pursue that claim.
Cass has since filed a lawsuit against the DOC for violating the whistleblower laws. With Wednesday’s Court decision, her PAB appeal will now be revived for another round of hearings running parallel to her whistleblower lawsuit.
The DOC is chronically understaffed and at the time Cass sent the email, there were shifts that saw hundreds of inmates supervised by one to three officers. Under DOC rules, corrections officers can be fired for taking any action that could endanger inmates or other staffers. Cass maintains that going along with the staffing levels inside Concord would have put people in real jeopardy.
After months of suspension that included an internal investigation and the forced psychological exam, Cass was fired for essentially disobeying an order that was never actually issued.
Corrections officers at Cass’ rank do not have the authority to impose a lockdown on their own, but Cass repeatedly told her supervisors she would impose a lockdown if she was assigned to another dangerously understaffed shift. Cass told Edmark and others that she has a legal and moral obligation to keep fellow officers and inmates safe.
The Department of Corrections has no written policy on what corrections officers are supposed to do when faced with dangerously low staffing situations. Former Commissioner Helen Hanks testified that Cass violated DOC rules by rejecting the hypothetical order. Hanks was dismissive when asked under oath why she did not write such a policy for her officers faced with an understaffed shift.
“I could write a policy about dogs, I could write a policy about all sorts of things,” Hanks said.
Hanks left her job suddenly in May under mounting pressure from Gov. Kelly Ayotte. William Hart took over DOC in August.