A former chief business official at the Stockton Unified School District is suing the district and three others.
The former chief business official, who is identified as Jane Roe, a fictitious name, in court documents, filed the 11-page complaint in San Joaquin County Superior Court on Aug. 5. She is being represented by Lodi-based attorney Mark Bowman.
The woman claims that those listed in the lawsuit have interfered with her role as a witness in a federal investigation into the district's finances. She is suing for defamation, intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligent infliction of emotional distress, false light, and intentional interference with contractual relations.
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The Stockton Unified School District, Stockton Unified's Interim Chief Business Official Joann Juarez, BAC Community Bank, and BAC's Chief Commercial Banking Officer Eddie Lira are listed as defendants in the five-count civil lawsuit.
A spokesperson for the Stockton Unified School District and Lira did not respond to a request for comment about the complaint by deadline.
What does the SUSD complaint claim?
In the fall of 2023, Roe was a fiscal expert employed by the San Joaquin County Office of Education (SJCOE), according to the lawsuit. Roe had previously been employed by the Stockton Unified School District as its chief business official, the suit states.
On Oct. 5, 2023, the lawsuit claims that Lira, in his capacity as chief commercial banking officer at BAC, sent an email to the Stockton Unified School District informing "certain individuals" that Roe's name appeared on the Office of Foreign Assets Control's (OFAC) Specially Designated Nationals List (SDN).
The Office of Foreign Asset Control of the U.S. Department of the Treasury administers and enforces economic and trade sanctions based on U.S. foreign policy and national security goals against targeted foreign countries and regimes, terrorists, international narcotics traffickers, those engaged in activities related to the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and other threats to the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States.
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People who are identified on the Specially Designated Nationals List are prohibited from doing business in the United States.
"Plaintiff's name has never appeared on the OFAC SDN watch list," the lawsuit states.
Lira requested that the email be forwarded to San Joaquin County Superintendent of Schools Troy Brown and SJCOE's Deputy Superintendent of Business Services Scott Anderson, court documents show.
Juarez, who was a recipient of the original email, forwarded the email to Roe's employer, the San Joaquin County Office of Education, according to the lawsuit.
On Oct. 9, 2023, the San Joaquin County Office of Education terminated Roe's employment as a result of the defendants' claims that she was on the Specially Designated Nationals List, the lawsuit alleges.
"We cannot provide a comment as this is a personnel issue," said Veronica Rabang, a spokesperson for the San Joaquin County Office of Education.
Federal investigation into Stockton Unified
The lawsuit also claims that Roe has had to hire legal counsel to attempt to mitigate damages and protect her reputation from further damage.
"The actions of defendants have interfered with plaintiff’s role as a witness in a federal investigation into SUSD misspending $7.3 million dollars," a portion of the complaint reads. "Plaintiff alleges on information and belief that the Lira letter was a coordinated attack on plaintiff’s personal and professional reputation by defendants to quash plaintiff’s ability to provide investigators with assistance in determining the disposition of the $7.3 million dollars."
In April 2023, the San Joaquin County District Attorney's Office confirmed that a multi-agency investigation with the FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice into "any and all wrongdoing" at Stockton Unified had been underway for several months.
District Attorney Ron Freitas said the investigation was initiated from the state Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team's Feb. 14, 2023 report that found evidence that fraud and misappropriation of funds likely occurred at Stockton's largest school district between July 2019 and April 2022.
The DA's office said the FCMAT report — which scrutinized a $7.3 million contract with IAQ Distribution, Inc., a subsidiary of Alliance Building Solutions, Inc., for air disinfectant technology — served as a "launching point" for the investigation.
The DA's office has been unresponsive to The Record's questions about the progress of the FBI, DOJ, and DA investigations. The FBI wouldn't confirm or deny the investigation's existence, a spokesperson told The Record in April.
A case management conference for the civil lawsuit, in which Roe seeks damages in excess of $35,000, is scheduled at 8:30 a.m. on Feb. 3, 2025 in Dept. 11B of San Joaquin County Superior Court.
Read the complaint:
Stockton Unified Lawsuit by eroberts on Scribd
Record reporter Hannah Workman covers news in Stockton and San Joaquin County. She can be reached at hworkman@recordnet.com or on Twitter @byhannahworkman. Support local news, subscribe to The Stockton Record at https://www.recordnet.com/subscribenow .
This article originally appeared on The Record: Ex-Stockton Unified chief business official sues district, bank over watch list allegation
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