Former AHS CEO asks for speedy ruling in lawsuit against Alberta government
A former health-care agency leader is asking a judge to deliver a quick decision on her wrongful dismissal lawsuit against the Alberta government, but the province says it will push back.
Athana Mentzelopoulos, the former CEO of Alberta Health Services, or AHS, has applied for a summary judgment on the legality of her January firing, which would avoid sending the case to trial.
Mentzelopoulos first filed the lawsuit in February, alleging that Adriana LaGrange, the province's health minister at the time, tried to shut down an investigation into questionable multimillion-dollar health services contracts and then engineered the CEO's dismissal.
The claims of corruption and high-level arm-twisting have sparked multiple investigations, including by the RCMP, the province's auditor general, and a former Manitoba judge hired by the government.
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Mentzelopolous' latest application, filed in Court of King's Bench in Edmonton this week, alleges LaGrange called a meeting to try to have the AHS board fire Mentzelopolous, but some directors refused.
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Mentzelopoulos says in a sworn affidavit she believes her claims will be confirmed by former board members if the court compels them to testify under oath as part of the application.
'I was told that when Minister LaGrange was asked why she wanted me terminated, she could give no substantive reason and gave none,' she says.
Mentzelopolous alleges that Andre Tremblay, who was on the board and the deputy minister of health at the time, was then directed by LaGrange to fire her.
'I had only positive performance reviews. To my knowledge there was nothing negative at all on my personnel file up to and including the day my employment was improperly terminated by Mr. Tremblay acting without AHS authority,' Mentzelopolous says.
Mentzelopolous says by directing Tremblay, LaGrange overstepped the authority of AHS directors.
Maddison McKee, LaGrange's press secretary in the new ministry of primary and preventative health services, said in a statement the reasons for the former AHS CEO's dismissal are clearly outlined in the government's statement of defence.
'The government will be vigorously opposing the former CEO's most recent application as it is legally baseless and contains a litany of misinformation and false claims.'
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The entire board was dismissed soon after Mentzelopoulos was fired.
In a statement of defence filed in March, the government said Mentzelopolous was fired not for investigating contracts, but for being an 'alarming' failure at her job.
It also alleged Mentzelopolous was stifling mandated health-care reform in order to retain the power and 'personal prestige' of her position.
LaGrange's statement said proper procedures were followed and that weeks prior to Mentzelopolous being dismissed, the AHS board chair signed off on the decision.
Premier Danielle Smith's United Conservative government has been aggressively restructuring the public health-care system, establishing four separate health-care ministries along with four new sector-specific agencies.
Once the provincial health authority, AHS is being reduced to a hospital services provider.
LaGrange's defence called Mentzelopolous' account a 'dramatic tale and false narrative' meant to squeeze more money out of the government on top of an annual salary approaching $600,000. Mentzelopoulos was fired one year into a four-year contract.
She is seeking $1.7 million in lost pay and damages, while LaGrange is asking that the suit be dismissed.
None of the allegations from either side have been proven in court.
In a March statement, Mentzelopolous said 'an army of lawyers' had been hired to defend the government.
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'I am worried there's a strategy to try to bring me to my knees financially, so I hope we can skip oral questions and proceed directly to trial,' she said at the time.
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