South Pittsburg towing suit dismissed in federal court


*South Pittsburg, TN – A court case that was originally filed in June of 2017 in U.S. District Court of Eastern District Tennessee alleging civil rights violations due to exclusion from the City of South Pittsburg’s ‘towing list’ has come to a close. Whereas the terms of the resolution were not disclosed, plaintiffs’ attorney Keith Davis indicated a mutual satisfaction with the outcome.

Originally, two cases were brought against South Pittsburg in 2017 by RJ Towing and Simmons Towing. Those two case would be consolidated alleging civil rights violations over their companies’ removal from South Pittsburg’s ‘towing list.’ Each municipality has a list of eligible towing services that service accident scenes and other towing requirements if one is not specified by the vehicle’s owner. The suit alleged that the decision, which left three towing services on the list, was “done intentionally for the purpose of benefitting the wrecker service by one of Mayor Holder’s supporters” referring to, then, Mayor Virgil Holder.

The main tenets of the suit were (1) the unlawful removal from approved call list, (2)Failure to provide right of appeal, (3) Punitive damages and (4) Attorneys’ Fees and expert fees. Additionally, the suit cited the business owners’ fourth and fourteenth amendment rights as being violated. Whereas, given it was ongoing litigation, parties were bound to the legal process there was a comment by Holder in a December of 2017 meeting that preference should be shown “to South Pittsburg based” wrecker services in relation to the removal of the towing services from the city’s list.

In the June 14 South Pittsburg monthly meeting, the board voted to allow the city’s liability insurance to negotiate a settlement in the suit with some limitations. The attorney of record for the city was William Bates, but bates was the attorney for the insurance company and asked that the request be made through the city’s attorney, Billy Gouger, to the board. Though the original complaint(s) called for “not to exceed” $75,000 per plaintiff, the final number was thought to be well below that figure. Keith Davis, attorney for the plaintiffs, conceded, “I think all parties were satisfied with the eventual outcome of the suit.”

This closes a chapter for South Pittsburg. The city has since appointed a new Chief of Police who has confirmed that there is a new ‘call list’ policy that has been being worked on and expected to be passed in the August meeting of the Board of Mayor and Commissioners.

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