Brooklyn Park City Council Member Maria Tran is suing the mayor and fellow council members, claiming the officials defamed her and violated her constitutional rights when they censured her and publicly asked for a mental health evaluation.
Tran also accuses officials of violating open meetings law and misusing city funds, stemming from the council holding a closed meeting after an employee filed a complaint against her. The city spent $11,000 on an outside investigation into the allegations, which led to the council in June voting to censure Tran.
The lawsuit, filed in late November in Hennepin County District Court, names Mayor Hollies Winston and four of the five other council members as defendants.
The only council member not listed in the suit is Boyd Morson, the only one who didn’t support Tran’s censure and the council’s call for a mental health evaluation. Morson, who has been censured twice during his time on the council, previously said council members are not mental health experts and should not be playing that role.
“I work tirelessly for my constituents, not for the other elected officials or City staff,” Tran said in a statement. “The unlawful and unjustified censure by the Mayor and a majority of the Council Members was unjust and must be rescinded.”
Her attorney, former Minneapolis City Council Member Paul Ostrow, issued a statement saying: “In all of my years both in politics and in following politics I have never seen such an abuse of power to quiet a voice of dissent in municipal government in Minnesota.”
Brooklyn Park spokeswoman Risikat Adesaogun said the city is aware of the lawsuit but cannot comment on the claims: “Our focus is delivering excellence in our core services and advancing our strategic initiatives to make Brooklyn Park a vibrant and thriving community.”
Council concerns about behavior
The mayor and council majority in October signed on to a letter saying that Tran was displaying a pattern of “increasingly disturbing behavior,” which had escalated in recent months, and they would like her to receive a mental health evaluation. The letter listed several examples, including that Tran allegedly claimed the council and staff were plotting to hurt or kill her.