Fort Worth City Council members approved up to $100,000 in legal fees for an outside lawyer to represent the city in a complicated whistleblower lawsuit that appeared to have been settled in 2024 for $850,000.
The council, on a motion by member Carlos Flores at their Tuesday meeting, unanimously approved the payment to attorney Courtney Perez of the BakerHostetler firm.
Council members in April 2024 approved what the city then said was an $850,000 settlement with former employee Trisa Crutcher, who had filed a whistleblower suit alleging violations in the Fort Worth Police Crime Lab, where she worked as a forensic scientist.
Crutcher, as a crime lab employee, filed a 174-page whistleblower complaint in 2020. The city fired her in 2021, according to the appellate court’s ruling. The same year, the Texas Commission on Forensic Science affirmed policy violations had occurred but concluded they didn’t rise to level of misconduct.
She filed two lawsuits — one in 2020 and another in 2023 — claiming she was retaliated against for reporting the violations. The suits were then consolidated and went to mediation.
Crutcher subsequently contended she didn’t agree to the 2024 settlement. The state Court of Appeals at the Fifth District of Texas at Dallas agreed with her in March, referring to the settlement as “alleged” and remanding the case to the 193rd State District Court in Dallas.
The city, however, has already paid the $850,000 to a court registry, according to the appellate ruling and city.
City attorney Leann Guzman gave the following summary Tuesday to the Fort Worth Report, which was confirmed by information in the appellate ruling:
- The city paid $850,000 into the court registry on June 21, 2024.
- A judge dismissed the city from the lawsuit July 1, 2024.
- The court held a hearing July 18, 2024, and found Crutcher breached her fee arrangement with her first attorney, Chris Medlenka. The court ordered the clerk to pay him $437,020.90 out of the amount the city paid into the registry.
- The judge later ordered that Medlenka be paid another $16,129.01 for his cost in asserting his claim and that the remaining $396,850.09 be mailed to Stephen A. Kennedy, Crutcher’s second lawyer.
According to the appellate documents, Kennedy was Crutcher’s attorney as of the court’s March ruling. Kennedy confirmed Wednesday to the Report that his firm, Kennedy Law P.C., still represents Crutcher.
Crutcher is seeking reinstatement to her job, “among other relief,” Kennedy said, citing what’s in the public record. “We decline to comment further regarding the pending litigation at this time.”
The city had sought in court to enforce the settlement and argued that Crutcher had acquiesced to it when she said in a court hearing in 2024 that she did not oppose the big payment to Medlenka, according to the appellate record.
The appellate court disagreed with the city.
“The city bore the burden of proof, and we conclude that the record does not show that Crutcher clearly intended to acquiesce in the judgment,” it said.
The court addressed the question of whether the money already paid out had dissipated to the point where it couldn’t be recovered if rulings favored the city.
“The record is silent on this point,” the court said.
The city does not plan to appeal the appellate ruling, Guzman told the Report.
This story contains previous reporting from a Fort Worth Report story in 2024.
Scott Nishimura is senior editor for local government accountability and a Fort Worth City Hall reporter at the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at scott.nishimura@fortworthreport.org.
At the Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. Read more about our editorial independence policy here.
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