ST. LOUIS (AP) - A St. Louis jury has awarded $175,000 to a former police chemist who says she was fired after complaining about drug testing errors at the city crime lab.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch (bit.ly/1msmnY7 ) reports that the jury deliberated for about five hours before reaching its verdict Thursday.
Ex-crime lab worker Margart Owens sued in May 2011 after she was fired the previous year, ending a 25-year career with the St. Louis Police Department. Owens alleged that her concerns about a co-worker’s mistakes three years earlier led to her dismissal.
State prosecutors countered that Owens instead lost her job for disobeying orders by working on a homicide case when she was told drug cases should be her sole priority. The Missouri Attorney General’s Office represented the city police department at trial.
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Information from: St. Louis Post-Dispatch, https://www.stltoday.com
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