‘Acting lawlessly’: Christina school board cuts ties with lawyer as superintendent prepares to sue individual members

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This story was supported by a statehouse coverage grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Christina School District and its long-time attorney, James McMackin, appear to have recently severed ties. The move comes just as the lawyer representing the district superintendent said his firm is working to finalize a lawsuit against the district on the superintendent’s behalf.

An email exchange obtained by WHYY News between Christina Board President Don Patton and McMackin shows the two trading words in the days leading up to the ribbon cutting of Maurice Pritchett Sr. Academy, the new $84 million state-funded school.

The lawyer pushed back against Patton’s allegations that he leaked information to the media, had not followed board policy and had a conflict of interest by previously negotiating Superintendent Dan Shelton’s contract, whom the board placed on leave in July in a divisive 4-3 vote for reasons still unclear.

McMackin called “this week’s insinuations” fabricated. He said it was the third time his duty to the district had been called into question.

“This Board tends to shift from weaponizing its counsel, to assailing its counsel, as part of the Game of Thrones it plays,” the document with his email signature and phone number said. “Delaware lawyers do not participate in this game — not when kids are involved. The search for replacement counsel will inevitably cross state lines if this Board seeks a ‘yes-man.’”

This is an abrupt departure for McMackin, who had told the board he was leaving, but would continue to represent them until they found new counsel. The board approved requesting quotes for a new firm at a board meeting earlier this month.

Board member Monica Moriak said she believes McMackin could no longer make excuses for board actions.

“I do not believe it’s defensible at all. I think we’ve been doing a lot of wrong things for a long time, a year,” she said. “I think a lot of what Mr. Patton was doing is wrong and I said that on the record over and over again.”

Attorney Tom Neuberger sent a demand letter to the board earlier this month and personally named the majority faction of the board pushing for the removal of Shelton, telling them to immediately cease violating his client’s due process rights and defaming his client and offer him a written apology. He also included details of a jury verdict he won about 10 years ago against individual school board members in Sussex County.

Neuberger said he is working on a breach of contract claim against the four board members he individually named — Patton, YF Lou, Alethea Smith-Tucker and Naveed Baqir — because they voted to rescind the extension of Shelton’s current three-year contract approved earlier this year. Moriak, Doug Manley and Amy Trauth voted against.

Neuberger said that the vote cost Shelton hundreds of thousands of dollars in wages, which the four board members must pay out of their own pockets.

“They’ve in effect discharged him without a pre-determination hearing,” he said. “He has constitutional rights under the due process clause. These people are state actors. Their lawyer is telling them they’re acting lawlessly.”

McMackin told the board in a July email obtained by WHYY News that board members who try to fire Shelton could face personal liability.

“Given the public record of animus, any members supporting termination only can overcome partiality issues — and personal liability — if the superintendent did something egregious — objectively — such that any reasonable person would terminate, despite partiality,” the email said. “No jury would conclude this is egregious when you are sued.”

A former teacher in the Allentown School District in Pennsylvania recently won a lawsuit against the district after he sued them for violating his civil rights and ultimately firing him after he attended the “Stop the Steal” rally on January 6, 2021. The jury ordered two board members, Nancy Wilt and Lisa Conover, to pay him punitive damages.

Patton said he could not comment on the legal issues involving the school district and a possible lawsuit from Shelton, including whether he’s concerned about being held personally liable. Smith-Tucker also had no comment while Lou and Baqir did not respond to a request for comment.

Neuberger’s reference to board members acting “lawlessly” also includes numerous civil rights violations at the board meeting earlier this month.

That meeting began with a 4-3 vote to remove items from the agenda, including some related to board member Naveed Baqir. Baqir and the private school he co-founded are under scrutiny concerning invoices submitted to the school district. The public was not allowed to comment before those items were removed by the majority faction of Patton, Smith-Tucker, Lou and Baqir. During the meeting, Patton made public a document from a district’s employee’s personnel file. He also allowed Baqir, who has been attending meetings remotely because he has been living overseas while still claiming to be a Delaware resident, to make a statement during the superintendent’s report but cut the mic of another board member because he did not like what they were saying.

That board member, Manley, was reading a comment from a speaker who was not allowed to speak during the public comment period. Patton said McMackin had told him non-Delaware residents could not make comments at meetings.

McMackin took Patton to task after the meeting. In an email to the board obtained by WHYY News, he said Patton lied to the public by saying non-state residents were prohibited from speaking at meetings. McMakin said Patton telling state Rep. Paul Baumbach to be more respectful during his remarks was censorship, allowing one board member to speak and not another was a form of “viewpoint” censorship, and not allowing the public to comment on the agenda items before the vote removing them violated open meetings requirements.

The board’s dysfunction has sparked concern at the highest levels of Delaware’s government. The state Department of Justice is currently monitoring the board as mandated by the General Assembly. New Castle County Executive Matt Meyer said the situation is unacceptable.

“I think what’s happening right now, looked at from the perspective of students and families who today are not getting an adequate or quality education, changes need to be made,” he said.

Out-going Gov. John Carney said he has faith in new Acting Superintendent Robert Andrzejewski, who was hired as the interim superintendent in a 4-3 vote at this month’s board meeting, with no explanation of his salary or how long he would remain in the role.

“They have a new acting superintendent who’s been there before,” Carney said. “I have confidence in Dr. A. Most people do.”

However, neither Andrzejewski’s name nor any other candidate for superintendent appeared on the agenda when the board voted. Moriak said the four-person majority on the board appeared to be discussing candidates for the position after the other three left an executive session, switching to text messaging when she returned to the room to get her belongings. Four board members gathering in private is a quorum, which may mean the board members were engaging in an illegal executive session. Lou told the Newark Post that several candidates had been discussed in a closed-door session. Lou, who recently told WHYY News that the media does not reach out to him or other members of the four-person majority on the board, did not respond to a request for comment or an interview.

WHYY News has submitted a FOIA request for any contract regarding Andrzejewski and communications between board members regarding his hiring.

The acting superintendent also does not have an active license from the Delaware Department of Education. The next school board meeting is September 11.