Tenured professor sues Hamline

She doesn’t know the law, but she does know her rights.

After being found guilty of four gross misdemeanors for failing to pay taxes, a Hamline law professor told the judge she didn’t understand tax law. Now, she’s suing Hamline and a police officer for violating her First Amendment rights.

Associate Law Professor Robin Magee, currently on leave of absence, is suing the Trustees of Hamline University, Dean Donald Lewis and St. Paul Police officer David Titus for First Amendment retaliation as well as a list of other claims including breach of contract and interference with employment. According to court documents, Magee claims the three parties worked together to retaliate against her for speaking out against police and a Minnesota judge in 2007 during the trial of an African American man who was charged — and later convicted — with killing a white police officer.

Four years later, Magee claims the charges brought against her are part of a larger attempt to prevent her from teaching at Hamline. After being sentenced to 80 hours community service and two years probation for failing to file her taxes from 2004-2007, Magee wasted no time drawing up her own charges. She filed suit against Hamline, Lewis and Titus the same day of her sentencing, seeking damages in excess of $50,000.

Magee claims the retaliation against her started in 2007 when she wrote an editorial for The Pioneer Press in which she accused the Minnesota justice system of being racist and criticizing the judge for not investigating reports of a racist juror.

In her editorial, she went on to accuse the police officer, who was shot and killed, of misconduct.

“These events, therefore, might reasonably be viewed as a modern-day version of an antebellum sport of Negrohunting — with the unmarked car replacing the horse, deranged slave catchers replaced by a menacing, inebriated, unidentified large white male — but with the modern twist of the hunted black able to defend himself,” Magee wrote.

That’s when Titus took to the Saint Paul Police Federation newsletter and responded to Magee in a spirited editorial titled “Shame on Magee.”

“After reading Magee’s ‘Gearin, Minnesota Supreme Court owe Sgt. Vick a proper tribute’ (April 15), one can only conclude that her idea of a fitting tribute would be dancing on Sgt. Vick’s grave,” Titus wrote. “But, the really contemptible part of her diatribe comes when she magically transforms the murder of Sgt. Vick into an attempted lynching of his murderer. It takes your breath away.”

In her suit, Magee claims Titus and the Saint Paul Police Department began communicating with Hamline after The Pioneer Press published her editorial to have her fired for speaking out against the police and the justice system.

“At first, Magee was not at risk at Hamline,” the suit alleges. “However, when Donald Lewis became Dean, the police got purchase and Dean Lewis began to work together with them, agreeing to first suspend and then terminate Magee. Lewis wanted to get rid of Magee from Hamline in order to please police.”

Lewis declined an interview with The Oracle, writing in an e-mail that “the situation regarding Associate Professor Magee involves an internal personnel matter and pending litigation.”

In an e-mail to The Oracle, Magee’s attorney, Jill Clark said Hamline should celebrate Magee rather than retaliate against her for her commitment to social justice.

“Hamline has celebrated its commitment to public purpose and the promotion of academic freedom. We’re concerned that not every member of Hamline’s community is willing to protect these aspects of Hamline’s profile,” Clark wrote. “Hamline should not succumb to the threats of boycott and retaliation because the exercise of Professor Magee’s First Amendment right and academic freedom. Academics must have the freedom to speak truth to power. Hamline should celebrate Professor Magee, not — as we see it — engender negative perception of its commitment to social justice and abandon Professor Magee.”

Clark, however, did not respond to repeated requests for an interview. When asked by The National Law Review how the parties conspired together, Clark declined comment telling the publication, “That will have to play itself out in the suit.”

As The Oracle reported in September 2009, Magee was originally charged with 11 felonies in Ramsey County for failing to pay taxes and filing fraudulent tax returns.

Although she told investigators she didn’t understand tax law, her Hamline profile said she concentrated on tax law in her private practice.

Prosecuting lawyer Dakota County Attorney James Backstrom, who covered the cased for Ramsey County due to conflict of interests, later dropped felony charges as further investigation revealed Magee did not willfully avoid paying her taxes.

Even so, Backstrom said he wanted to see her serve jail time.

“I think she should have gone to jail for 90 days, which is what we asked for. I think some jail time was appropriate given the circumstances,” Backstrom said.

During the sentencing, Magee claimed she was unable to file her taxes due to extreme Attention Deficit Disorder and because tax law is “hard.”

“She also made claims that this prosecution were racially motivated which are completely false and offensive, and the judge expressed his concerns about those claims being made as well,” Backstrom said.

Magee prolonged the hearing process with numerous continuances, but the case may still not be over if Magee chooses to appeal the decision. She has until May 15 to do so.