Hennepin County pays $1.6M to settle ex-prosecutor’s lawsuit against Mike Freeman, Mary Moriarty

In the largest employment settlement in county history, the Hennepin County Board agreed to pay $1.6 million to former veteran prosecutor Amy Sweasy.

Sweasy alleged in a whistleblower lawsuit that she was forced out of her career by Hennepin County Attorneys Mike Freeman and Mary Moriarty because she objected to the handling of criminal charges against three of the police officers involved in the 2020 murder of George Floyd.

The suit was nearing a jury trial, which would have publicly unspooled the inner workings of the County Attorney’s Office. The settlement agreement was made public Tuesday evening.

During a motion hearing in June, Judge Laurie Miller, who oversaw the case after it was reinstated by the Minnesota Court of Appeals, said: “There is nothing about this trial that isn’t going to be awkward.

“I love jury trials, and I think this one will be fascinating,” Miller continued. “But I can’t imagine it’s a trial that anyone who is a party to it can be terribly comfortable with.”

The two sides avoided the trial at the last minute, hammering out an agreement that nearly unraveled after the County Board refused to approve a settlement last month that had been signed by both parties.

Attorney Sonia Miller-Van Oort, who represented Sweasy, said the settlement couldn’t undo the damage done to Sweasy’s career but it was a testament to her willpower.

In a statement, Deputy Hennepin County Administrator Dan Rogan said the county denied any liability and “approved this settlement to avoid the expense, disruption, and uncertainty of a jury trial.”

Hennepin County Attorney spokesman Daniel Borgertpoepping said in a statement that Moriarty was put in a difficult position by the previous administration and Sweasy’s “refusal to appropriately charge Derek Chauvin and the other officers in the murder of George Floyd.”

He added that Sweasy resigned after being given an opportunity to “lead a unit of critical importance” and that Hennepin County had reached a settlement to avoid a lengthy trial that would “retraumatize our community.”

Hearings, memos, motions and depositions in the lead-up to a potential trial over the lawsuit showed that several judges — including former prosecutors who had since been appointed to the bench — could be called to the witness stand, not to mention Moriarty, Freeman and former Hennepin County Administrator David Hough, who retired in July.

Text messages and emails between various high-ranking officials within the County Attorney’s Office were also shared and a motion was filed to forensically examine the personal cellphone of Freeman over allegedly deleted specific text messages regarding Sweasy. Miller denied that motion last month.

“Facing discrimination and retaliation in a workplace I respected was both painful and profoundly disappointing,” she added. “This five-year legal journey was challenging — but necessary — to hold a powerful institution accountable.”

The details of the settlement show that within 18 days Sweasy will be paid $850,000 for alleged “non-wage damages” and $50,000 for wage loss, and $700,000 will be paid in attorney’s fees to Sapientia Law Group.

Sweasy agreed to not seek employment with the county in the future, but if she did seek employment it would have to be approved by the County Board. Sweasy can still seek elected office in the county.

In 2022, Sweasy received a $190,000 settlement from Hennepin County that stemmed from a sex discrimination and retaliation complaint she filed with the Minnesota Department of Human Rights.

Sweasy claimed Freeman said a female attorney in his office had “the judgment of a toad” and “big white boys like us aren’t going to be ruling the world anymore.” He allegedly added that “we already had to let the white girls in because we need someone to keep our feet warm at night.”

After the discrimination settlement, a new role was created for Sweasy within the County Attorney’s Office making her a principal attorney leading a complex prosecutions unit. In that role, Sweasy would handle significant homicide, child abuse, domestic abuse and cold cases along with matters relating to career offenders, while also directing other prosecutors.

She no longer reported to Freeman, who was set to retire at the end of 2022, but to Dan Mabley, the County Attorney’s Office criminal chief deputy, who would make staffing and caseload decisions for Sweasy’s unit.

Sweasy alleged that Freeman continued to undermine her career, and Mabley said Freeman’s conflict with Sweasy over the prosecution of Chauvin and several other police officers was “never resolved.”

Although Freeman was initially named as a party to the lawsuit, he was later removed by a district court judge, in a decision upheld by the Court of Appeals.

The whistleblower claim centered on Sweasy’s role in drafting the initial criminal complaints in the murder of Floyd.

“Based on the evidence I have reviewed so far in this nine-day investigation, making this decision at this time is to charge three men with crimes for which there is not yet sufficient evidence to prosecute and no clear plan on how to acquire that evidence,” Sweasy told Freeman in 2020, according to the statement. “Such evidence may one day exist but today is not that day.”

Van-Oort said Sweasy was told she could not have additional time “to gather evidence and formulate the appropriate charges.”

Sweasy was not the only prosecutor to withdraw from the case, but Miller-Van Oort said Sweasy “was the only one to suffer ongoing retribution because of her adherence to ethical requirements.”

Nine days after Floyd was murdered, the three officers were charged with one count each of aiding and abetting second-degree murder and aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter. The murder charge was ultimately dismissed in all three cases.

After Moriarty was elected, Sweasy was removed from the prosecutions unit and reassigned to work on the complex economic crimes unit within the special litigation division. In her first three months in that role, Sweasy was given three low-level cases, and even though she reported directly to Moriarty, Moriarty had no contact with Sweasy about her work.

The county argued that Moriarty had legitimate reasons for moving Sweasy to the special litigation division. Those included “differences between Sweasy’s and Moriarty’s prosecution philosophies, Sweasy’s relationships with others in the office, and Sweasy’s skill set.”

Several colleagues said Sweasy was “being shunted off to the side” or “squeezed out” of her career.