PEMBROKE PARK, Fla. – Pembroke Park’s former human resources director has filed a whistleblower lawsuit against the Broward County town and controversial commissioner and ex-mayor Geoffrey Jacobs.
Babette Friedman is seeking more than $2 million in the lawsuit, which was filed in Broward County court on Dec. 13. It claims actions taken by the town created a “hostile work environment,” violating Florida law, and also violated her First Amendment rights.
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Friedman claims she had no choice but to leave her job in September over the “intolerable” working conditions Jacobs’ behavior created; she claims that Jacobs called her a “Nazi” during a public food drive in May as she investigated complaints against Jacobs from multiple town employees.
Jacobs, the subject of multiple Local 10 Investigates stories, has had a tumultuous time on the dais in the south Broward town of about 6,000 people.
Fellow commissioners censured Jacobs in June and an investigation by an outside law firm, released in August, found that he “engaged in an extensive series of “threatening, humiliating, or intimidating behaviors” towards town employees and fellow elected officials.
The 12-page lawsuit states that Jacobs claimed he didn’t recall calling Friedman, who is Jewish and a descendant of Holocaust survivors, a “Nazi,” but “suggested he had ‘another four-letter word’ that would apply to her” and it was “inferred” that he “meant the same derogatory word (’c---’)” he allegedly used to describe former Town Attorney Melissa Anderson.
Read the full lawsuit:
Jacobs is also accused of attacking Friedman on social media and verbally attacking and threatening six female town employees.
The lawsuit states that town employees are “terrified to stand up for themselves or disagree with Commissioner Jacobs due to fear of verbal abuse, job threats or condemnation on his social media posts.”
Friedman also claims that “there is not one female in a position of authority with whom Commissioner Jacobs can work with, a sentiment echoed by every commissioner and employee interviewed” in the investigation.
The lawsuit claims the town “continues to be deliberately indifferent to the known risk of constitutional law violations posed by Commissioner Jacobs” by failing to take disciplinary action against him.
The commissioner most recently made headlines after calling the Broward Sheriff’s Office on Mayor Ashira Mohammed during a commission meeting and claiming she had a gun. She agreed to be publicly searched by the town’s police chief, who did not find a gun.
Jacobs referred Local 10 News’ request for comment on the lawsuit to his attorney, Michael Pizzi, who had not responded to a separate request as of Wednesday evening.
A Pembroke Park town spokesperson said Wednesday evening that officials haven’t yet seen the lawsuit and, therefore, couldn’t comment on it.
Friedman now works as the HR director for the city of North Miami Beach. She is also the president of the Florida Public Human Resources Association.
According to online records, no court hearings had been scheduled in the case as of Wednesday.