The suit was filed in 2020 after an investigation was conducted by an integrity commissioner a year earlier.
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A couple who sued Osgoode Earl. George Darouze, following an integrity investigation into harassment, is withdrawing the lawsuit after realizing a trial would consume more time and money than they are willing to spend.
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Kristen and Reinhard Lechleitner sued Darouze for $32,500 in June 2020 after becoming dissatisfied with how the integrity process ended.
The legal drama ends just months before residents of the Osgoode district decide who should represent them for the 2022-2026 Ottawa city council term. Darouze is seeking a third term.
Pursuing the lawsuit was not worth the time, stress and potential cost associated with a trial, Kristen Lechleitner said.
She is an operating room nurse and also works with Indian Services Canada, serving remote communities in northern Ontario, and Reinhard Lechleitner is a constable with the Ottawa Police Service.
Kristen Lechleitner said they were prepared to settle, but Darouze wanted to take the claim to trial.
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Darouze did not respond to a request for comment Thursday. His lawyer, JF Lalonde, confirmed that a judge upheld the withdrawal of the lawsuit.
Former integrity commissioner Robert Marleau launched a conduct investigation in 2019 after learning that Darouze emailed the police chief, who was Charles Bordeleau at the time, to complain about social media posts by the wife of a officer criticizing police deployment decisions in the Osgoode area.
The police chief reviewed Darouze’s complaint for assessment and an inspector and staff sergeant found the observations in Kristen Lechleitner’s Facebook posts to be accurate. Senior officers notified Reinhard Lechleitner, who at the time learned of the posts and was assured that no action would be taken by the police.
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In the report summarizing his conduct investigation, Marleau wrote: “the councilman’s main motivation was to harass and intimidate” the Lechleitners “in the hope that the complainant would stop criticizing him on Facebook”.
Marleau did not call for a financial penalty to be imposed on Darouze, but recommended that the council reprimand the councilman and that Darouze issue a sincere written apology to the Lechleitners. Marleau also recommended that the council direct Darouze to ask the police chief to remove the councilman’s email from Reinhard Lechleitner’s personnel file.
On September 25, 2019, the council received and approved Marleau’s recommendations without discussion.
Kristen Lechleitner attended the council meeting to see how the mayor and council members responded to the integrity report.
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“I was angry,” she said Thursday. “They did nothing”.
The Lechleitners filed their lawsuit against Darouze in small claims court. The couple received an award of $30,000 in recognition of the sanctions that were available to the integrity commissioner in making a recommendation to the council on sanctions. The maximum penalty for a conduct violation is a 90-day wage suspension.
The Lechleitners were also dissatisfied with Darouze’s apology, particularly a part that read, “I heard you perceived my actions as harassing and I’m so sorry.”
In the court file, Darouze’s defense document, dated January 2021, alleged that he had been the subject of defamatory comments on social media made by Kristen Lechleitner.
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In his defense, Darouze said he complied with the recommendations in the integrity commissioner’s report, including asking interim police chief Steve Bell to remove his email from Reinhard Lechleitner’s file and write an apology to the Lechleitners.
Darouze argued that the Lechleitners were not harmed and asked the court to dismiss the lawsuit.
The most recent settlement conference took place last week, which led to the Lechleitners’ decision to end their lawsuit.
The Lechleitners were not represented by counsel during the trial.
Reinhard Lechleitner said they proceeded with the lawsuit because they believed the action had a good legal basis, not because they had “hurt feelings” about Darouze’s conduct.
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In deciding to end their lawsuit, the Lechleitners said they were also concerned that property taxpayers could be forced to pay any court-ordered damages if Darouze was ordered to pay.
The city of Ottawa was not a named defendant in the lawsuit.
The Osgoode district has become one of the hottest races ahead of the Oct. 24 municipal election.
One of Darouze’s rivals is Doug Thompson, a former councilman and last mayor of Osgoode Township, who endorsed Darouze in the 2014 municipal election. Their sour relationship became a rumor in the city council after Darouze’s election, and now Thompson wants the seat back.
But Darouze has eight years of experience on the council and has served as deputy mayor in the current term. He won 54 percent of the vote in the 2018 municipal election in a five-candidate race in the Osgoode district.
As of Thursday, other candidates running for Osgoode’s 2022 job included Dan O’Brien and Bob Masaro.
Kristen Lechleitner, who considered running for the job, said she was volunteering for Thompson’s campaign.
