HOPE SMITH
editor-in-chief
hope.smith393@my.tccd.edu
TCC’s former vice president for development plans to appeal her lawsuits against the college that led to the departure of former Chancellor Eugene Giovannini in 2022.
Kristin Bennett asked the court Oct. 16 to dismiss her Title VII retaliation claim, according to the case document. The court agreed Nov. 1.
Nine other claims by Bennett were previously dismissed by the court. Nothing has been filed since, but she has several more weeks to file.
The appeal, once filed, will be heard by the federal Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans, according to TCC’s general counsel Carol Bracken.
The Title VII retaliation claim was the final claim, and Bracken said TCC was well-prepared and ready for the trial Oct. 31. However, a few days before, Bennett’s attorney, Frank Hill, filed a motion to dismiss the last remaining claim, and Judge Jane Boyle granted his request.
The dismissal was made “with prejudice,” meaning Bennett will not be able to appeal that claim in the future.
Hill explained that the main charge among the nine remaining claims is that Bennett had the right to a due process hearing, but it was refused.
“It’s been a phenomenal thing that the district has always resisted giving constitutional due process over these years, and I do not know what the root of that mindset is,” he said.
Hill has not just represented Bennett, but many former TCC employees as well. He said they all relate in a major way.
“Most of the cases centered around the refusal to give due process,” he said.
He believes there are various reasons why the former employees he has represented are fighting for due process. He says it seems like a mindset TCC has to move for quick termination.
“In the Tarrant County College District, there has been a long mindset that the employment human relations concept is that it’s us against them,” he said. “It’s the administration against faculty and against employees. And if there’s the slightest evidence that the faculty person did something wrong, the Tarrant County College mentality is, ‘Let’s jump on it.’”
