CHARLESTON – A former employee is suing Encore Management Company after she claims she retaliated against for answering questions truthfully during an investigation.
St. Martin Development Company LLC and Douglas E. Pauley were also named as defendants in the suit.
Jennie W. Curry was employed by Encore and at various times during her employment, she complained to Pauley about various misrepresentations orchestrated by Pauley, especially in connection with applications for funding of low-income housing development from the West Virginia Housing Development Fund, according to a complaint filed Dec. 16 in Kanawha Circuit Court.
Curry claims Pauley was "cooking the books" in the budgets to the WVHDF to obtain funding for the projects off of which Encore would earn substantial management fees.
Once the projects were being developed and funds were not adequate to cover the necessary costs, Pauley would isuse the working capital, thereby depleting the funds necessary for the operation of the apartment complexes, leading to a broad range of problems with managing and maintaining the complexes.
Curry claims Pauley also exhibited offensive and discriminatory conduct and used company assets for his purely romantic activities.
In 2011, law enforcement authorities, including the Federal Bureau of Investigations, began investigating Pauley and Encore, according to the suit.
Curry claims on Oct. 25, 2011, she was interviewed by FBI investigators and truthfully answered their questions about Pauley's conduct and the following day, she testified in connection with the FBI investigation concerning Pauley's financial dealings and campaign contributions.
Pauley then began retaliating against Curry by ostracizing her and excluding her from meetings and important activities of Encore and by cutting her pay in February 2012, according to the suit.
Curry claims by the time she was constructively discharged in February 2013, her base salary had been cut by at least 80 percent.
Curry is seeking compensatory damages with pre-judgment interest. She is being represented by Drew M. Capuder of Capuder Fantasia PLLC.
The case is assigned to Circuit Judge James C. Stucky.
Kanawha Circuit Court case number: 14-C-2187
