Plaintiffs pay price for Knox County lawsuits

Citizens who changed the face of Knox County government by successfully suing to enforce term limits and sunshine laws were recently hit with a combined $33,000 in unexpected court costs.

"Almost everyone thinks if you win a case, then the loser pays for it," said Bee DeSelm, one of 18 plaintiffs who were recently assessed court costs. "We eventually did win and got charged for all of the cases we had going up to the Supreme Court. We think it is wrong and something needs to be done."

In 2005, DeSelm filed the first of several lawsuits that said many of Knox County's elected officials exceeded term limits established by the county's charter. Years of legal wrangling by DeSelm and members of the county commission eventually carried the case to the Tennessee Supreme Court.

The State Supreme Court upheld the Knox County charter and its term-limits provision, thereby forcing 12 elected officials who exceeded the established limit to resign.

"When the case went to the Supreme Court, a lot of the cases we had in other courts were put on hold or taken under advisement," said Knoxville attorney Herb Moncier, who represented the citizen plaintiffs. "We won in the Supreme Court, but the other judges have ruled the cases we filed in their courts are now 'moot' or they dismissed for other reasons."

Since those smaller courts never made a ruling in the plaintiffs' favor, the courts now hold the plaintiffs responsible for costs associated with their cases.

DeSelm said the group appealed the costs "without very good results."

"There were challenges, but we reached the point where we thought $33,000 was as far as we could go," said DeSelm.

Jim Gray was another plaintiff charged court costs, some of which came from the group's victorious lawsuit against the County Commission for violating the Tennessee Open Meetings Act. In October 2007, a jury ruled the Knox County commissioners violated sunshine laws during a special meeting on January 31, 2007, to appoint replacements for the 12 ousted commissioners.

Despite winning the sunshine law case concerning the commission's handling of the now infamous January 31 "Black Wednesday" meeting, Gray said the courts decided to fiscally send the plaintiffs further into the red.

"Before the trial, the court merged our case with another suit filed by the News Sentinel. Then we won that trial." Gray said. "But after we won, the court somehow decided to 'unmerge' our case, dismiss our case, and charge us costs. This is uncharted legal territory from what I can tell."

"We did what we thought was a good activity for the community, but it did not work out that way financially," said DeSelm.

"These citizens, they are truly patriots of Knox County," said Moncier. "It is a shame they are saddled with these court costs when they were right all along."

DeSelm said none of the money owed by the group is for attorney fees. Moncier represented the group with the agreement that he would only be paid if he won the case, with compensation then coming from damages assessed to any losing defendants.

"When the cases started, I had hundreds of people call me who wanted to join these citizens' efforts. But it was not necessary at the time for them to do so." Moncier continued, "Now is the time for all of the people who supported what these citizens did for Knox County to contribute and help defray this cost."

The group has set up a website soliciting donations for what it calls the Knox Charter Defense Fund in order to cover the court costs. DeSelm said the group has received approximately $14,000 thus far.

"We're trying to get some help paying this bill and we have collected almost half of it to this point. There are a lot of people willing to share the costs and I appreciate that very much," said DeSelm.

Gray said if the group receives donations in excess of its legal bills, any surplus money will be donated to a local charity. There is also a chance the group can recover some of its costs if awarded damages in cases still pending.

Gray said he is concerned the fees will have a chilling effect on those who wish to challenge local government.

"We thought we won," said Gray. "In Knox County, questioning authority is at your own risk. We did what we thought was right, and we ended up suffering the consequences."