CHARLESTON – A former Administrative Law Judge says she was passed over for a job because of her race, age and previous litigation.
Sarah N. Hall filed her complaint February 27 in Kanawha Circuit Court against the state Offices of the Insurance Commissioner and the Workers’ Compensation Board of Review. Hall is Black and over the age of 40.
According to the complaint, Hall was an Administrative Law Judge with the Office of Judges of the Offices of the Insurance Commissioner from 1999 until she was fired by the Workers’ Compensation Board of Review on September 30, 2022.
Hall says BOR Commissioner Nick Casey called her on March 1, 2022, to tell her she was not selected for continued employment as a Hearing Examiner as part of the transition of ALJs formerly employed by the OOJ to the BOR in 2022.
The complaint says the OIC capped the number of OOJ employees the allowed to be transitioned to BOR employment as well as capped the salaries the BOR was allowed to offer those employees.
Hall says she had the second longest tenure of any ALJ but was not selected for retention. She says four ALJs with less tenure were kept by the BOR. She also says she did not receive any adverse performance reviews or disciplinary actions during her time as an ALJ with the OOJ.
When Hall asked Casey why she wasn’t being retained, she says Casey told her he “didn’t want to get into that.”
The complaint claims several OIC officials “collaborated in the preparation of the budget for the BOR, which resulted in the non-selection of the plaintiff and other ALJs.”
After the initial selection of ALJs offered employment with the BOR, Hall says two of those selected declined.
For the first position, the BOR hired Lisa Warner Hunter, a white woman who was not employed as an ALJ for one of those positions. Hall says she was not contacted to see if she was interested in the vacancy.
For the second position, Hall and others were interviewed for the vacancy. But she Mark Campbell, a white male, was selected for retention.
In an August 30, 2022, letter from state Insurance Commissioner Allan L. McVey, Hall learned she was being laid off as of September 30, 2022.
“All OOJ ALJs considered for retention by the OIC and BOR in 2022 were white with the exception of the plaintiff,” the complaint states.
Hall says she was the only Black ALJ at the time of the transition, was the third longest-serving ALJ at the time of the transition and was also one of three female ALJs who had previously participated as a plaintiff in federal Equal Pay Act litigation seeking equalization of female ALJ pay as compared to male ALJ pay. That litigation was settled in 2018.
The complaint also says the OIC was found to have engaged in illegal retaliation against former OOJ Chief Administrative Law Judge Rebecca Roush by attempting to remove her from her position because of her support of Hall’s efforts to obtain gender pay equity.
Hall says the decision to twice not select her for a Hearing Examiner position was based on her race, age and participation in the previous pay litigation. All of those, according to the complaint, are violations of the West Virginia Human Rights Act.
She also accuses the defendants of retaliation and reprisal.
Hall seeks compensatory damages, injunctive relief, court costs and attorney fees.
She is being represented by Walt Auvil and Kirk Auvil of The Employment Law Center in Parkersburg. The case has been assigned to Circuit Judge Stephanie Abraham.
Kanawha Circuit Court case number 24-C-271
