2nd document dispute related to ex-sheriff Hatcher just costs Benton Co. another $70k

Benton County is paying $70,000 to settle another public records lawsuit after refusing to hand over a 205-page report involving a troubled former sheriff.

The commissioners unanimously agreed to pay Katie Gillies, a Benton County sheriff’s office administrator, after withholding a whistleblower investigation into Jerry Hatcher’s actions for about a year.

She brought the lawsuit to hold the county accountable for trying to hide a document from the public after it had already released it as part of a trial, her attorney, Alan Harvey, told the Tri-City Herald.

Gillies, who filed the lawsuit outside her capacity as a sheriff’s office employee, made several public record requests for county investigations into whistleblower complaints.

While officials turned over others, the county refused to hand over the results of an investigation into then sheriff’s Commander, Tom Croskrey’s complaints about his former boss. Croskrey has since become the sheriff.

Croskrey was one of several high-ranking sheriff’s office administrators to come forward about Hatcher’s behavior during his tumultuous term in office before he was recalled by voters in 2021.

His complaints about threats, violations of the law and constitution and concerns about the sheriff interfering in investigations became the focus of a whistleblower investigation conducted by Rebecca Dean for attorney Rachel Turpin.

The county, which is still in the middle of a multi-million dollar lawsuit with several former deputies, refused at the time to hand the report over to Gillies, claiming it was protected by attorney-client privilege.

This was even after the county turned over the complete report to the attorney representing the deputies, according to court documents.

County officials eventually handed a redacted version over to Gillies after she sued in June, but they didn’t admit to improperly withholding the document in the settlement.

County Administrator Jerrod MacPherson has previously declined to comment on the litigation.

This is the second time in a month the county has agreed to pay a requester after it was sued for not turning over records associated with Hatcher’s term in office.

The county paid $45,000 public records advocate Eric Hood to end a public records lawsuit around audit records involving a Washington state audit that found the county didn’t turn over all of the records related to a state audit.

Threats, anger and lies

Croskrey was initially hired by Hatcher in 2019 to run the jail, and stayed on after the county commissioners decided to take over running the jail that same year.

Problems began to surface when Hatcher was accused of domestic violence against his estranged wife, and became worse when 13,700 rounds of county ammunition were discovered at Hatcher’s home.

Croskrey served as the acting sheriff when the initial allegations of domestic violence became public.

He put a safety plan in place, changed locks and turned off the sheriff’s key card access to the department’s firearms room.

When the sheriff returned, he was “extremely angry,” but didn’t order Croskrey to reinstate his access, Croskrey said in his statement to the county.

As Hatcher escalated to threatening to fire employees who had talked with his ex-wife, Croskrey went to the county administrator and the chief deputy civil prosecutor to raise concerns in February 2020.

He took those complaints to the Benton County Human Resources director and then the Benton County commissioners in June 2020.

Croskrey resigned in the same month and sent a three-page complaint about his former boss to the Human Resources department.

When Croskrey’s complaints become public in June, Hatcher provided an interview and said Croskrey lied, wasn’t “strong enough” to be sheriff and that he had a stress-related medical condition.

Dean was asked to investigate the whistleblower complaint and turned over her report in February 2021. She found that Hatcher behaved “in an intimidating and angry manner,” and that he made false statements.

After Hatcher was ousted, a group of five former and current deputies filed a lawsuit claiming the county didn’t protect them from Hatcher, who invaded their privacy, defamed them and created a hostile work environment.

The lawsuit, initially filed in federal court, now in Walla Walla Superior Court, does not ask for specific damages, but the original tort claim was for $22 million.

Both sides trade information as part of a process called “discovery” at the beginning of the case. As part of that, the county handed over Dean’s report with little taken out, according to court documents.

Public records request

Gillies, who still works for the county, initially asked for Dean’s report in May 2023.

In a response about a month later, the county responded that it was withholding the report because it fell under attorney-client privilege.

Gillies sent several questions to a Benton County Prosecutor’s Office public records specialist about withholding the document. Harvey said in court documents that the county’s responses didn’t answer Gillies’ questions.

The request was finished in November 2023. Then on June 7, 2024, Gillies sent an email directly to Prosecutor Eric Eisinger to challenge the exemption, according to the complaint.

Civil Deputy Jeffrey Aultman responded, and cited an appeals court case that found the county could use the same rules it would normally use for documents handed over during discovery, according to court documents.

While Aultman claimed the report hadn’t been released, Harvey argued in the complaint that it had, with little of it blacked out.

“It appears that the exemption Benton County claimed is without merit and that the county has wrongfully withheld the document from providing it to the plaintiff,” he said.

In addition, Harvey said the commissioners had waived the attorney-client privilege on the documents in a 2022 commissioner meeting.

After the lawsuit was filed, the county did release a redacted version of Dean’s report, which tried to protect Croskrey’s identity.

With the settlement, the full report won’t be released. Harvey said his client wanted to highlight the issue and wasn’t looking to cost the county more money.

“She wanted to hold them accountable, so that people would understand the county needs to stop withholding these documents,” Harvey said.