It isn’t clear yet who will represent two Livingston Parish councilmen sued for defamation earlier this month by embattled engineering firm Alvin Fairburn & Associates.
Livingston Parish Council Chairman Marshall Harris and Councilwoman Cindy Wale were sued individually, and not in their official capacity as council members. The lawsuit centers on a recent investigation by local television station WBRZ into whether council meeting minutes may have been altered by former council clerk Mary Kistler to make it appear that the council had authorized the firm to perform thousands of dollars in work that was not intended.
Alvin Fairburn & Associates claims the pair—both of whom were interviewed as council members for the broadcast—were engaging in a campaign to hurt the firm’s reputation. Discussions are under way as to whether Harris and Wale will be represented by parish lawyers, or whether they will have to retain their own attorneys.
District Attorney Scott Perrilloux, whose office is responsible for the parish’s legal representation, was unavailable today for comment. But he told a Hammond cable television news station that research into the matter is ongoing.
“Our initial research was that what they did and the manner in which they did it [do] not constitute official council business and actions of a councilman,” he says. “We can’t just provide a lawyer to anybody out there.”
However, Chris Moody, the Hammond lawyer tasked with actually handling the parish’s legal matters, told Harris and Wale in a letter last week that if the parish’s insurance company gives the go-ahead, he will represent them in the case. Otherwise, the council, Perrilloux and Livingston Parish President Layton Ricks will have to sign off on it. Moody also wrote that losing the case is an “unlikely event.”
This isn’t the first time Alvin Fairburn & Associates has sued a government official for defamation. In late 2011, the firm sued then-Livingston Parish President Mike Grimmer over campaign ads mentioning it and Ricks—who was working for Alvin Fairburn & Associates at the time—in connection with $52 million in Hurricane Gustav debris cleanup described as “bogus.” That case is currently at a standstill.
Alvin Fairburn & Associates is also defending itself in two other lawsuits involving its business with the Livingston Parish Council, including one in federal court. The firm has also sued the council over cancellation of a professional engineering services contract that extended through 2021.
