PITTSBURGH – A member of the Vandergrift Borough Council alleges that since January, five fellow council members, the mayor, chief of police and a police officer carried out a campaign of defamation and slander intended to ruin her reputation and drive her out of public office.
Karen McClarnon filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania on May 28, versus the Borough of Vandergrift, Kathy Chvala, Christine Wilson, John Uskuraitis, Thomas Holmes, Lenny Collini, Barbara Turiak, Joseph M. Caporali and Nathan Rigatti. All parties are based in Vandergrift.
McClarnon says she has criticized a number of issues in the Borough’s operation, such as its alleged lack of written or standardized operating procedures, activity taking place at the Casino Theatre, fiscal management of the borough-owned pool, alleged intimidation at the hands of local police targeting her family, alleged nepotism and the Borough Council allegedly conducting secret meetings in violation of the Pennsylvania Sunshine Law for government transparency.
McClarnon adds local officials have engaged in at least two dozen forms of retaliation against her, including but not limited to, allegedly declining to provide a police report from when her husband was pulled over in front of the plaintiff’s home; the Borough Council allegedly refusing to give her prior notice of meetings; Collins allegedly spreading false rumors she had been fired from her prior role as principal at Cardinal Maida Academy for theft and Caporali allegedly telling an officer that the plaintiff had phoned into a Borough Council meeting while drunk, when she was only out of town and in no way intoxicated.
“All of these actions have been performed in an attempt to keep plaintiff McClarnon from participating in Vandergrift Borough Council business and to prevent her from carrying out her constitutionally-protected and mandated duties in retaliation for her criticisms of the borough and of council,” the suit states.
“All of the foregoing actions have been motivated by defendants’ desire to silence plaintiff McClarnon who has been an outspoken, vocal minority critic of defendants’ policies and actions as majority members of Vandergrift Borough Council.”
For counts of violation of due process, defamation and violation of liberty interest and violation of free speech, the plaintiff is seeking an injunction restraining the defendant from continuing violation of any of the alleged acts taken against her, damages in the form of costs, attorney’s fees and such other and further relief as is deemed appropriate.
The plaintiff is represented by William Lafferty in Pittsburgh.
The defendants have not yet secured legal counsel.
U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania case 2:20-cv-00779
From the Pennsylvania Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com