Lawyers for the Warrenton Fire Protection District are asking a judge to dismiss a wrongful termination lawsuit filed by a former firefighter who has since passed away.

Former firefighter Anthony Bailey, who died unexpectedly in January, had sued the fire district in March 2021 after being terminated more than a year prior. The lawsuit is being continued on behalf of Bailey’s family.

Bailey alleged that the fire district used an off-duty fight as a pretext to fire him, but that the real reason he was terminated was because he complained after supervisors made comments that Bailey felt were discriminatory toward his age and weight.

However, in new documents asking Circuit Court Presiding Judge Jason Lamb to dismiss the case, attorneys for the fire district have revealed previously unpublicized information about the October 2019 violent altercation that led to Bailey’s firing. After a purported road rage incident, Bailey and another driver allegedly got into an argument at a traffic light that ended with both of them out of their cars in a fist fight.

A police report from that incident stated that officers found Bailey on top of the other driver, “striking (the man) in the head three to five times with a closed right hand fist,” according to the court filing. Bailey reportedly had to be convinced to get off the other man, who was driven away in an ambulance with both eyes swollen nearly shut and his face “red with multiple pools of blood,” according to the fire district’s description of the police report.

It was the review of that information, and photos of the other man’s injuries, that caused the board of directors for the fire district to terminate Bailey for “conduct unbecoming of a firefighter,” the district states. The code of conduct prohibiting district employees from engaging in potentially illegal activity applies regardless of whether the firefighter is on duty, according to the district.

That violent incident being a direct cause for Bailey’s firing is one of the reasons to dismiss the lawsuit, according to attorneys for the fire district. But their legal filing also argues several other reasons that Bailey’s complaints don’t meet legal muster.

Bailey’s allegations lacked evidence that the board of directors considered his age and weight, or his complaints about alleged harassment from supervisors, when voting to terminate him, according to the filing. If any supervisor did make comments about Bailey’s age and weight, he didn’t file a complaint with state anti-discrimination regulators until after the 180-day reporting period required by state law, the fire district’s attorneys said.

And, to the extent that Bailey might have had a legitimate claim for wrongful termination, that claim was already settled through private arbitration as part of Bailey’s union contract, the attorneys add. Before filing the lawsuit, Bailey had sought arbitration through the firefighters’ union, got a successful ruling, and then turned down reinstatement.

Courts have a core principle that a new legal claim can’t be filed for a matter that has already been fully decided. Since Bailey’s claims were already resolved through arbitration, the circuit court should decline to issue any new ruling on the matter, according to the request to dismiss the lawsuit.

Attorneys representing Bailey’s family in the wrongful termination case have not yet responded to the fire district’s court filing, and Judge Lamb has not yet set a date to hear oral arguments.