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Talk Kentucky Athletics! |  | 
06-29-2009, 03:31 PM
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#1 (permalink)
| | Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Lexington, KY Age: 26
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Given High Fives: 3,969 Rep Power: 10030  | |  UK asks court to drop BCG's lawsuit UK asks court in Texas to dismiss or move Gillispie's lawsuit | KentuckySports.com Quote:
By Ryan Alessi / ralessi@herald-leader.com
The University of Kentucky has asked a federal court in Texas to dismiss former UK basketball coach Billy Gillispie's lawsuit or at least move the case to a Kentucky courtroom.
UK's attorneys filed the school's motion to dismiss late Friday in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas in Dallas, where Gillispie sued the UK Athletics Association last month, alleging breach of contract.
The university also had filed a countersuit in Franklin District Court in Kentucky last month claiming that Gillispie had sued the wrong entity in the wrong venue.
Gillispie "attempts to bring these convoluted claims against UKAA to avoid the fact that the university is a state agency of the Commonwealth of Kentucky and, due to sovereign immunity, cannot be sued in Texas," wrote UK attorneys Stephen L. Barker of the Lexington firm Sturgill, Turner, Barker & Maloney and Michael P. Royal, a Dallas-based lawyer.
"Alternatively, the lawsuit should be transferred to Kentucky — where the overwhelming majority of the witnesses reside and where the alleged acts for the basis of this suit occurred."
Gillispie's lawsuit alleged that UK's athletics department owes him $6 million for firing him two years into a seven-year agreement.
But UK responded that Gillispie shouldn't be paid the buyout because the two sides never agreed on the terms of a formal contract.
Gillispie's suit said Texas is the appropriate venue because that's where Gillispie was when UK Athletics Director Mitch Barnhart offered him the men's basketball head coaching job in April 2007. The suit also contends that Gillispie and Barnhart negotiated basic terms of the hiring agreement over the phone before Gillispie first flew to Lexington to be announced as the new coach on April 6, 2007.
UK, however, argues that Texas had very little to do with the hiring process.
The first interview between Barnhart and Gillispie was arranged by a search firm and was in Atlanta during the 2007 NCAA Final Four championship, according to the brief.
"The only other third party that had contact with Texas was an airplane pilot" who picked Gillispie up to take him to Lexington, the brief adds.
At the center of the dispute between Gillispie and UK is the validity of a memorandum of understanding that laid out basic terms of the coach's employment but was far less detailed than a traditional contract. The two sides clashed over several provisions of a proposed contract, including what would allow UK to fire Gillispie "with cause."
Gillispie's attorney has argued that the memorandum of understanding has the same legal weight as a contract and that the university referred to that two-page memo as a contract several times when responding to questions or issues surrounding Gillispie's employment.
UK officials have said since Gillispie's firing that the memo of understanding was a temporary agreement that essentially allowed Gillispie to coach on a year-to-year basis and that university leaders decided he wasn't "the right fit" to stay on after his first two years.
UK's attorneys acknowledge in their latest filing in Texas that the contract question remains an important controversy that must be resolved — just not in Texas.
"The state of Kentucky has a strong interest in these issues, particularly where public funds may be at stake," UK's attorneys wrote.
The filing includes a declaration by UK President Lee T. Todd Jr., which supports the argument that the case belongs in Kentucky. Todd also details the lengthy contract negotiations that were never resolved.
On June 19, 2008, Todd said, he and Barnhart met with Gillispie for two hours and reviewed "line by line" the latest contract offer, which by then "included a second car and increases in several monetary provisions above the figures" in the original memorandum of understanding.
"Billy Gillispie left both of us with the impression that he was in agreement with the University's proposed contract as we discussed," Todd said in the filing. UK sent Gillispie a revised contract on July 17, 2008, and the same contract to Gillispie's then-attorney, Stuart Campbell, on Jan. 8, 2009.
"I was surprised to learn" in mid-February that Campbell had again rejected the proposed contract, once again striking out the grounds for cause to terminate, Todd said.
| What say you legal eagles? I definitely agree w/UK....wtf does the state of Texas have to do w/this? It's clearly a Commonwealth issue and all proceedings should take place w/in the state of Kentucky. If Gillispie's worried about a fair shake, take it to Jefferson County. Louisville's the only place in the state where the jury/judge/etc isn't going to be 100% biased towards UK. | 
#2 Kentucky Wildcats 34-2 (14-2)
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TWO DOWN, FOUR TO GO | |  | |
06-29-2009, 03:35 PM
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#2 (permalink)
| | Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Ruston, Louisiana Age: 29
Posts: 2,811
High Fived: 1,282 in 619 posts
Given High Fives: 592 Rep Power: 5757 | | | I say he's gonna get some of that paper. | | | | | | |
06-29-2009, 03:40 PM
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#3 (permalink)
| | Oct. 2005 Poster of the Month Join Date: May 2005 Location: Oxford, MS Age: 26
Posts: 10,359
High Fived: 1,194 in 719 posts
Given High Fives: 8 Rep Power: 2203 | | | This is going to turn out to be something that goes into a law textbook in the upcoming years. You have contract issues, civil procedure issues, labor issues. All the good stuff. I still think they owe him the full money though. The MOU as a "year to year agreement" argument is bogus but I can only say that because I've never seen the MOU. | | | |
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