Beth Rist, now city councilwoman, seeks job back

Former Ironton Police Sgt. Beth Rist is asking the Ohio Supreme Court to help her get her job back with the Ironton Police Department.

On Dec. 9, Rist filed her appeal of a ruling by the Fourth Appellate Court that said the city of Ironton did not have to reinstate her to the force.

Rist, who is now a city councilwoman, filed a civil rights lawsuit over the summer alleging discrimination and wrongful termination. However, the Fourth District Court of Appeals court ruled in October that her termination was legal.

Rist was fired following a 2008 incident where she was accused of falsifying a traffic ticket. Rist pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge for her actions and was ordered to serve two years probation.

After Rist filed a union grievance protesting her termination, an arbitrator determined that she had been terminated without cause and ordered that she be reinstated to her position.

Following an appeal by the city of the arbitrator’s decision, Rist’s termination was reinstated. That termination was upheld by the court of appeals in October.

Rist’s appeal to the high court states it seeks an opinion about whether the courts can review and reverse policies based on public policy, whether the courts can vacate an arbitration award reinstating an employee based on the court’s determination that the employee violated public policy and whether an arbitration ruling providing for the reinstating of an officer who was found to have broken the law violates any public policy.

“Should the decision of the court of appeals be permitted to stand, state employees and unions will be forced to conclude that the terms to which they contracted with their state employers can be nullified based upon courts’ refusal to be bound by the legislated provisions of the Ohio Arbitration Act, R.C. 2711 and courts’ subsequent adoption of the non-legislated ‘public policy exception,’” the appeal states.

“Undermining in this manner parties reasonable expectations that Ohio courts will enforce contract provisions governing arbitration of disputes, necessarily will have an adverse impact on public confidence in collective bargaining.”

Rist filed the lawsuit against the City of Ironton and its police department June 1 in the U.S. District Court. In it, she claimed that she was terminated because of her gender and in retaliation for her documented opposition to what she alleges was discriminatory treatment.

The lawsuit alleged that her termination and the city’s failure to reinstate Rist were motivated by a desire to discriminate against her for protesting a hostile work environment.

In 2001, Rist, who was hired in 1996 as the department’s first female officer, successfully sued the city in a suit that alleged sexual harassment and a hostile work environment.

Reached Tuesday afternoon, Ironton Police Chief Jim Carey declined to comment. Rist referred comments to her Cincinnati-based attorney, Marc Mezibov. Ironton Mayor Rich Blankenship declined to comment, saying he had not yet seen the official appeal. A call to Mezibov was not immediately returned.