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Former Memphis-Shelby County Faculties Superintendent Marie Feagins is now suing a board member for private defamation in an ongoing lawsuit over her January firing after lower than 10 months on the job.
Feagins testified on Tuesday in Shelby County Circuit Courtroom, the place Decide Robert Childers thought-about Feagins’ request for a preliminary injunction, which might overturn the board vote to terminate her contract and reinstate her as district chief because the lawsuit performs out.
“I got here right here to do a job, and we have now unfinished enterprise,” Feagins stated on the stand. “I didn’t come to sue the college district.”
At concern, Feagins alleged throughout a seven-hour listening to Tuesday, was a number of cases of board members assembly secretly to orchestrate her ouster, which she says violates the Tennessee Open Conferences Act. However the defendants’ lawyer argued that board members can privately focus on the superintendent’s job efficiency with out operating afoul of state regulation.
At one level, Childers struck a few of Feagins’ testimony over rumour issues.
The divided board ousted the previous superintendent in January in a 6-3 vote, with the bulk accusing Feagins {of professional} misconduct and poor management lower than a yr into her tenure. Dozens of neighborhood members, together with lecturers and elected officers from each events, urged the board to retain Feagins previous to the vote.
Feagins filed her lawsuit in February. She additionally alleged that interim Superintendent Roderick Richmond, a longtime district administrator, was informally tapped to take over her job after assembly with board members within the fall.
The decide on Tuesday granted Feagins’ request to amend her official grievance to incorporate defamation claims towards board member Towanna Murphy, who she says unfold “completely reckless and wild” rumors that Feagins participated in stealing her private automotive and committing forgery.
Murphy declined to remark Tuesday evening on Feagins’ defamation allegations.
“At stake right here is not only Dr. Feagins,” stated the previous superintendent’s legal professional William Wooten. “It’s the general public’s proper to open, lawful decision-making by elected officers. That proper has been disregarded, trampled and violated.”
Feagins stated Tuesday that she by no means acquired a proper analysis from board members for her efficiency regardless of being fired with trigger. She additionally stated the “baseless allegations” and “smear marketing campaign” ruined her repute and future employment prospects.
She’s in search of $487,500 in backpay and extra advantages within the lawsuit.
However Robert Spence, the lawyer representing the district, stated Feagins is conflating the college board’s proper as her employer to speak about job efficiency privately with “deliberation and decision-making,” as outlawed by the Open Conferences Act.
Spence stated the “absence of proof” of that line-crossing is the “largest gulf” between Feagins and the district.
Wooten stated that clearing the bar for a preliminary injunction solely requires the plaintiff to point out there’s “chance of success” primarily based on the deserves they’ve earlier than the total trial begins, and reveal “irreparable hurt.” It doesn’t require the case to be confirmed in full, in response to state regulation.
In the course of the listening to, Spence made a number of objections to what he referred to as “quadruple rumour” from Feagins, saying her primary proof relies on listening to issues from different folks, not witnessing or listening to conversations herself.
Feagins stated having precise data of what was stated in conferences “would imply I had consciousness in actual time.”
As a substitute, she described telephone calls and conversations the place she was requested about her ousting earlier than she ever acquired official discover from the board. Wooten introduced invoices, name logs, and textual content messages – proof of what he referred to as “serial personal conferences” that led as much as Feagins’ firing.
However Decide Childers rejected a few of the testimony from Feagins the place she described conversations between different those who she wasn’t current for, calling it “rumour twice-removed.”
Some key takeaways from witness testimonies
Feagins stated she first heard mentions of her potential termination in August 2024. She alleged Tuesday that then-Vice Chair Joyce Dorse-Coleman, who launched the formal decision to fireside Feagins on Dec. 17, informed her over the telephone that she “had the votes” to oust her.
Feagins stated board member Stephanie Love informed her over the telephone a few assembly between herself, Dorse-Coleman, and former board chair Althea Greene on August 21 the place they mentioned firing the superintendent – one in all many conferences Feagins stated occurred earlier than the decision to terminate her was publicly launched.
Feagins additionally stated she acquired a textual content from Love and different board members with the primary draft of a decision on Oct. 16.
“If it’s being circulated, it’s clearly being mentioned amongst the board members,” Wooten added.
Deidre Malone, who runs a PR agency employed by the college board from November 2024 by way of June 2025, informed the courtroom that she didn’t conduct or witness any habits that violated the Tennessee Open Conferences Act whereas working with the college board.
However Wooten stated a sequence of conferences documented in Malone’s invoices to the board contradicts that declare.
On December 7, Malone billed the board for 4 hours of labor on a communications plan that she stated Tuesday was “80%” about Feagins’ potential termination. Malone met with board Chair Dorse-Coleman and Vice Chair Love on Dec. 10 and 16 to debate that “communications technique,” she stated on the stand, and to movie movies with the board leaders explaining the reasoning for her termination.
All of these conferences pre-date the primary “particular assembly” referred to as by board members to publicly focus on the termination decision on Dec. 17.
Malone additionally had calls with 4 of the six board members who voted to terminate Feagins, in response to her invoices, within the days following that Dec. 17 assembly.
“We represented all of the board members who wished us to symbolize them,” Malone stated. These conversations had been about Feagins, she stated, and “getting ready [board members] for what was going to occur subsequent.”
Wooten additionally introduced texts that Jalen Washington, who works with an out of doors tutoring firm employed by the college board, despatched to Feagins’ former government supervisor, warning him concerning the superintendent’s pending termination – and saying that Richmond could be her substitute.
Washington despatched these texts on Dec. 14. However he stated Tuesday that he “can’t recall” who he received the knowledge from, saying he heard rumors from many individuals and the media.
Wooten performed a Dec. 18 Fox13 interview of board member Murphy, the place she says Chair Dorse-Coleman personally referred to as each member of the college board two days previous to Dec. 17.
“I feel an elementary scholar may present the violations on this video,” he stated.
Feagins stated that as quickly as she noticed the interview, it grew to become “apparent” that the choice to fireside her “was predetermined.”
Bri Hatch covers Memphis-Shelby County Faculties for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Attain Bri at bhatch@chalkbeat.org.
