Fired reformatory official files suit

Friday, Jan. 28, 2005 | 9:01 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- A man who is fighting to regain his supervisor job at the state youth reformatory in Caliente has beaten the state to the punch in filing a lawsuit.

Bruce Burgess, through his Las Vegas attorney Adam Levine, filed suit in District Court in Las Vegas to try to force the state to continue to pay him his annual salary estimated at $55,000 while the state appeals a hearing officer's order to reinstate Burgess.

Burgess, who had worked at the center since 1991, was fired in September 2003 for taking 11 hydrocodone tablets from the office of nurse Lorrie Green, without permission in July 2003. Hydrocodone is a painkiller and is listed as a controlled substance.

In a decision earlier this month, Hearing Officer David Ford ordered Burgess reinstated with all back pay, minus any earnings from other jobs since September 2003. Ford said the entire city of Caliente reacted to the dismissal and became polarized over the incident.

The state, complying with the Ford decision, put Burgess back on the payroll but told him to stay away from the institution until it decides whether it will file a court appeal.

Jone Bosworth, administrator of the state Division of Child and Family Services, said Monday the state would appeal to the courts to overturn the reinstatement. She also said the state would ask the courts to stop Burgess from receiving state pay during the judicial proceedings.

Levine said Tuesday he filed the lawsuit, in part, to force the state to keep Burgess on the payroll. He also said he specifically avoided filing the lawsuit in Lincoln County, where Caliente is located, because he believed the case had become too politicized there.

Bosworth said Burgess pleaded guilty to a felony and it was in the best interest of state as well as the youth at the reformatory that he not be returned to his job. Burgess said he pleaded guilty and was placed in a "diversionary" program. Once he completes that, the felony will be erased from his record.

Burgess maintains he had a prescription for hydrocodone for a spine ailment. He said that he was required to work overtime and could not get away from the center to have the prescription refilled. He said he asked the nurse for approval to take the pills and then refill them later when his prescription was renewed. He said he did subsequently renew his prescription and was ready to replace the pills three days after taking them from the infirmary.

Green has testified she doesn't remember any such conservation.

There was testimony that Green had also dispensed medication to other workers who did not have prescriptions for the drugs, but a state investigation did not find substantiation for the allegations, state officials said.

But a complaint was filed with the state Board of Nursing in April 2004 that Green had given out drugs and provided medical treatment without the necessary orders from a physician. Green and the board reached a stipulation in which she admitted she had done so from 2001 to 2003.

Green was placed on three years' probation, ordered to take education courses and she will operate with a "restricted license" during the probationary period.

She has also left the training center in Caliente.