A handful of high-profile lawsuits ended late last year, putting to rest allegations of wrongdoing at two national corporations as well as two Atlanta agencies that serve gay men and lesbians.

A lawsuit claiming wrongful termination filed Aug. 6 by Melvin Stringer against his former employer, the Atlanta Gay & Lesbian Center, was expected to be settled in late December, according to attorneys involved in the case.

“It is my understanding that before Christmas we will have it all settled,” Schuyler Elliot, Stringer’s attorney, said last week.

But neither Elliot nor attorneys for the Center could be reached by press time on Dec. 30 to confirm the settlement. The suit was filed in Fulton County state court, where it remained pending this week, according to court officials.

After receiving a termination letter on July 29, 2003, Stringer filed a lawsuit claiming wrongful termination, breach of contract, slander, libel and unlawful rendering of legal services.

The suit named the Center, Board Chair Lolethia Chapman, and Donald Smith, primary donor and former board chair, as defendants.

Prior to serving as health director for the Center from May to July, Stringer was hired as the facility’s philanthropic advisor in a contract that paid Stringer some 10 percent of the donations he secured.

Smith credited Stringer with finding an “anonymous donor” to pay for the Center’s $460,000 Midtown home in interviews with Southern Voice, but Smith in later interviews revealed that he was the donor.

For securing the 11th Street home for the Center, Stringer received partial payment of $21,088 that was apparently owed based on the value of the $460,000 house that Smith donated, according to court documents.

The remainder of the 10 percent philanthropic advisor fee had not been paid to Stringer in August when he filed suit. Stringer asked the court to force Smith to pay him $24,912 for breach of contract.

But in a counter suit filed Sept. 15, an attorney for the Center and Smith stated that Stringer owed at least $26,000 to the Center and $27,650 to Smith.

The Center’s board intended to keep Stringer’s role as a “philanthropic adviser” confidential, according to an agreement signed by Stringer, Smith and Chapman.

The agreement — dated Aug. 17, 2002, and obtained by Southern Voice as part of court records in Stringer’s lawsuit — bound each signing party “not to disclose the terms of the agreement to the public” or any person outside of the Center’s board.

AID Atlanta claim closed
Terence McPhaul filed a $10 million lawsuit against AID Atlanta on April 8, alleging he was wrongfully terminated because he acted as a whistleblower. But the case was ended Oct. 15 with the consent of all parties involved, according to records from the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.

The case is considered closed with the stipulation that claims brought by all parties are dismissed.

McPhaul and Kim Anderson, executive director at AID Atlanta, declined any comment on the termination of the lawsuit.

McPhaul claimed in the lawsuit that he was wrongfully terminated after reporting “AID Atlanta’s constant efforts to defraud funding agencies, and AID Atlanta’s constant efforts to place its clients in situations that did or could cause them physical and/or emotional harm.”

The suit named as defendants Anderson; Elaine Alberti, director of finance and human services; Chris Parsons, director of advocacy and community relations; and case group managers Amy Richter, Raphael Holloway and LaTonya Wilkerson.

Anderson cautioned against “jumping to conclusions” over the lawsuit, but declined further comment.

Taco Bell claim settled
A former Taco Bell employee who filed a same-sex harassment suit last year against a supervisor settled the case earlier this fall, according to Mitchell D. Benjamin, an attorney representing Theodore Winston, the former employee.

But Benjamin refused to discuss details of the settlement.

Winston filed the suit in April 2003, alleging a supervisor of making unwanted sexual advances, assault and trespassing. The suit also named TME Enterprises, the fast food chain’s parent company, as a defendant for negligence to mitigate the sexual harassment.

A lawsuit filed last year by Margaret Tolbert, an IBM employee and College Park resident, challenged a company policy that allowed co-worker Dana Brown Owings, a transgendered woman who is a biological male, to use women’s restrooms. A judge dismissed the lawsuit last September. (Photo by Christopher Seely)

Attorneys representing TME and Dennis Allen, the man accused of sexual harassment, could not be reached by press time.

Winston moved to Atlanta from Pittsburgh in January 2003 for management training with TME. In early February, Allen allegedly entered Winston’s apartment with a spare key, removed his clothes and crawled into bed with Winston, according to court documents.

When the lawsuit was filed, an attorney for TME and Allen denied the allegations made by Winston in court documents, and asked that Winston’s lawsuit be dismissed.

Transgender suit dismissed
One woman’s fight to change an IBM policy of allowing male to female transgendered employees to use restrooms for women stalled in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia because the woman, who acted as her own attorney, did not follow proper court procedure, according to court documents.

Judge Charles Pannell upheld the policy when he terminated Margaret Tolbert’s lawsuit, ruling that Tolbert did not follow the “proper service and process” of the courts and failed to “state a claim,” according to Kimberly Fulton, Pannell’s assistant.

IBM filed a motion to dismiss the case, which Pannell granted Sept. 9, Fulton said.

Tolbert, a College Park resident and IBM technical service representative, filed suit on Dec. 6, 2002, seeking to force a change in the company’s policy that allows Dana Brown Owings, a transgendered employee who is a biological male, to use restrooms for female employees. The suit alleges gender-based discrimination because “male individuals are given preferential treatment.”

“This person, this transgender is nothing more than a transvestite,” Tolbert told Southern Voice June 26. “He still has a penis attached to his body, but IBM has given him the right to use the ladies’ bathroom and I have a real problem with that.”