FRANKLIN — A former teacher dismissed from her job in Williamson County wants the people who allegedly helped to get her fired to retract a written statement they made about her.
And that woman, Nedra Finney, is using the courts to try to make that happen.
Finney and her Nashville-based attorney Michael Clemons filed a defamation lawsuit against two parents she says wrote a letter that cost her her job. The parents, who are unidentified, allegedly wrote a letter to members of the Franklin Special School District and accused Finney of mistreating their child and acting unprofessional on the job.
Finney told The Tennessee Star the accusations are untrue.
On Tuesday, Finney and Clemons attended a hearing where those parents, who did not attend, made a motion to dismiss the lawsuit Finney filed against them.
In her lawsuit, Finney said all she wants is for the parents to write a letter retracting the statements they made about her — and to cover the cost of her legal fees while she tries to exonerate herself.
“My understanding is the parents refuse to write a letter of retraction of the false statements,” Finney said.
“I didn’t pay much attention to the (Brett) Kavanaugh hearings. I just know what I read in the paper, but the basic message from that was an individual can certainly form an opinion based on an allegation with no substantiation.”
At Tuesday’s hearing, the parents’ attorney, Jim Tomkins, argued before Judge Deanna B. Johnson that the parents’ letter is not defamatory.
Clemons, however, told Johnson the allegations in the parents’ letter prompted school officials to dismiss Finney from her job.
Johnson told the attorneys she would have an order out on the matter soon.
According to a 2016 issue of The Tennessean, Finney lost her job due to “several allegations of altercations with students dating back to 2014.”
Finney told The Star the accusations have no merit.
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Chris Butler is an investigative journalist at The Tennessee Star. Follow Chris on Facebook. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Franklin Special School District” by Franklin Special School District.
