On April 4, four whistleblowers were awarded $6.6 million in their longstanding lawsuit against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. The whistleblowers claimed they faced retaliation for blowing the whistle to the FBI on Paxton’s alleged misuse of power.
The judgement was issued by Travis County Judge Catherine Mauzy who stated that the whistleblowers proved liability “by a preponderance of the evidence.”
“Because the Office of the Attorney General violated the Texas Whistleblower Act by firing and otherwise retaliating against the plaintiff for in good faith reporting violations of law by Ken Paxton and OAG, the court hereby renders judgment for plaintiffs,” Mauzy writes.
The whistleblowers filed the lawsuit back in 2020. James Blake Brickman, David Maxwell, J. Mark Penley, and Ryan Vassar are four out of eight former employees who reported Paxton to the FBI in 2020 over allegations of bribery, tampering with government records, obstruction of justice, harassment, and abuse of office and were subsequently removed from his office. These four sued Paxton for wrongful termination and retaliation, claiming that Paxton retaliated and violated the Texas Whistleblower Act by firing them in the fall of 2020 after they filed a complaint with the FBI.
The whistleblowers had alleged to the FBI that Paxton had used the agency to serve the interests of a political donor and friend, Nate Paul, an Austin real estate investor.
Paxton did not dispute the facts in the case.
“It should shock all Texans that their chief law enforcement officer, Ken Paxton, admitted to violating the law, but that is exactly what happened in this case,” said Tom Nesbitt, an attorney for Blake Brickman, and TJ Turner, an attorney for David Maxwell, in a joint statement Friday evening.
The whistleblower allegations led to his impeachment by the Texas House of Representatives. However, he was acquitted by the Texas Senate on September 26, 2023, on 16 articles of impeachment.