New Castle County settles harassment case against former police lieutenant colonel

By Rachel Sawicki
Posted 1/27/22

NEW CASTLE — New Castle County Council on Tuesday approved $3 million to settle a case against former New Castle County Police Lt. Col. Quinton Watson, who was accused of sexually harassing six current and former female county employees in June 2020.

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New Castle County settles harassment case against former police lieutenant colonel

Posted

NEW CASTLE — New Castle County Council on Tuesday approved $3 million to settle a case against former New Castle County Police Lt. Col. Quinton Watson, who was accused of sexually harassing six current and former female county employees in June 2020.

The bill comes in two parts: $1.3 million to fund attorney fees and $1.7 million to fund the county’s portion of the settlement with the plaintiffs.

The women’s claims also allege that various NCCo officials, including Police Chief Col. Vaughn Bond and County Executive Matt Meyer, turned a blind eye to Mr. Watson’s predatory behavior against female subordinates and ignored their complaints of harassment and assault.

“We have our Tax Stabilization Fund, which we use to pay for unscheduled and other kinds of unforeseen expenses,” Councilman John Cartier said. “So we’re able to maintain the fiscal integrity of the county and take care of this claim and still have a substantial rainy-day reserve and tax stabilization reserve for the future.”

The county said Mr. Watson has agreed to pay an amount directly to the plaintiffs to settle their claims, but no portion of the $1.7 million will be used to pay his segment.

Ultimately, Councilman Cartier said the council decided to settle the suits based on other such cases across the country and to eliminate the possibility of an even more expensive charge if the situation ended up in court.

“Sexual harassment is a very serious matter, and we don’t tolerate that in the county government. We don’t want to have that go on,” he said. “And I think there was some measure of compensating the women that suffered sexual harassment from Lt. Col. Watson over many years.”

The county’s attorney brought in outside counsel to represent NCCo and the individually named officials and employees, which resulted in over a million dollars in legal fees.

Mr. Watson retained his own counsel at no county expense.

“I hate to say this, but it’s part of doing business in government today,” Councilman Cartier said. “It is a large amount of money, but we were hiring the best possible attorneys to work on behalf of the county government and the citizens and taxpayers. It is a tough pill to swallow, but if you’re in a legal action, you need the best defense you can get.”

The councilman added that the arrangement will also settle all future claims pertaining to Mr. Watson or any other county employees implicated in the matter.

Mr. Watson joined the police department in 1987 and steadily rose through the ranks, being promoted to lieutenant colonel, the second-highest position in the agency, in April 2017. Despite the investigation, he retired “in good standing” in 2019, according to the NCCPD.

In addition to Mr. Meyer, Chief Bond and Mr. Watson, former public safety director Michael Hojnicki and current chief administrative officer Vanessa Phillips were named as individual defendants in the lawsuit.

In other business Tuesday, council moved $47,837 from the Department of Transportation to the Cranston Heights Fire Co.’s Traffic Safety Vehicles Grant to purchase additional traffic safety vehicles. These vehicles are a part of a transportation improvement project. This increase in spending will impact fiscal year 2022 only, since the targeted completion date of this award is June 30.

Council members also doled out $35,000 given by the state to the New Castle County Housing Department’s Housing Everyone Locator Program, as part of a Home4Good grant. The funding will impact fiscal years 2022 and 2023, since the targeted completion date of this award is Dec. 31.

This is the second grant award to New Castle County for the housing locator program. The first was in 2019, for $30,000 with a 100% required match. There is a full match required on this year’s grant, as well, which will be met with funds in the 2022 Housing Choice Voucher grant. Council noted that there is no discernible operating budget impact from the match for this grant.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

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