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BOISE, Idaho (AP) — A former Idaho Department of Labor employee says the agency used subpoena powers to obtain his personal cellphone records and then fired him over the results of the search.
According to a whistleblower lawsuit filed Wednesday in federal court, James Cryer was fired for sending anonymous emails to state officials complaining about violations in one of the labor department divisions, The Spokesman-Review reported (http://bit.ly/2hanEbd ).
According to the lawsuit, the department used its subpoena powers to identify Cryer as the author of the anonymous emails.
Idaho's state Employment Security Law grants subpoena powers to the labor department's director, a member of the state Industrial Commission, to gain evidence deemed necessary in investigating unemployment and wage-dispute cases.
"The only way I can describe it is pretty outrageous," said Erika Birch, Cryer's attorney. "We represent whistleblowers, so we're used to seeing retaliation against folks who speak out or refuse to do things that are illegal, but it's rare that we see a government agency abuse its powers like that to go after someone."
Cryer was placed on administrative leave pending an investigation last May. In June he was called to the Idaho Attorney General's office and confronted with the anonymous emails he had sent. He admitted he sent them and explained why. Two weeks later he was fired for "conduct unbecoming a state employee or conduct detrimental to good order and discipline in the department," according to the lawsuit.
Cryer had claimed a labor department employee in the IT division had attempted to violate purchasing laws, such as buying expensive items that should have gone to bid. Cryer tried to alert his superiors about the issues. When his alarms were ignored, Cryer sent seven anonymous emails from his cellphone outside of work restating his concern to officials at the department.
The department then created a case investigating the security of the unemployment trust fund and issued two subpoenas to determine the source of the anonymous emails.
Department of Labor Director Ken Edmonds had no comment on the lawsuit Wednesday.
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Information from: The Spokesman-Review, http://www.spokesman.com
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