Fired Professor Gets Additional Award of $585,000 : Courts: Punitive damages against Chapman University bring the total verdict to $1.14 million for wrongful dismissal.

By GEORGE FRANK

Feb. 25, 1992 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

SANTA ANA — A former Chapman University professor who claimed she was denied tenure and wrongfully fired was awarded $585,000 by a Superior Court jury Monday, bringing her total verdict against the school to more than $1.14 million.

Margaret Murphy, 49, of Lake Forest, who taught at the college from 1978 to 1986, said her outspokenness on campus on behalf of faculty issues led to her job loss.

“I think being a woman and speaking out against the administration led to my denial of tenure and finally being fired,” Murphy said Monday following the verdict. “If I had been a quiet and submissive woman, they probably would not have treated me this way.”

Murphy, who has a doctorate in exercise physiology and taught sports medicine at Chapman, was awarded $562,000 by the jury on Feb. 11 for economic loss and emotional distress. In the second part of the two-phase trial, the same jury awarded Murphy another $585,000 on Monday in punitive damages.

Named in the suit were the college, former president Godfrey T. (Buck) Smith and former dean of faculty Cameron Sinclair. They have since left the school.

Attorneys for the college did not return telephone calls Monday, and James L. Doti, president of Chapman, said he could not comment on the matter because several court hearings remain in the case.

But Michael A. Hood, who represented Chapman and the other defendants, contended during the trial that Murphy was legitimately denied tenure on economic grounds.

She was hired in 1978 and recommended for tenure in 1982 but was told by the administration that it could not afford to give her tenure--permanent employment--despite repeated lobbying by the faculty committee on her behalf.

Murphy said she finally agreed to a five-year contract with the university that would have paid her about $40,000 a year. She had been paid $28,500 a year for nine months of work. The university breached that agreement, she alleged, by choosing “to sneak in phrases in the contract that would have allowed them the right to fire me at any time with a year’s notice.”

She was fired in August, 1986.

Murphy, who at one point was vice chairman of the faculty, said her problems stemmed from her protests of administration actions, such as a proposal to merge her department with the athletic department. Murphy said she had challenged college officials when they made decisions without consulting the faculty.

“What’s so important about my case was that the administration, by hook or crook, sabotaged the faculty’s self-governance, which is so critical to the protection of academic freedom against arbitrary attack by administrators,” Murphy said. “The faculty recognized the significance of my suit and stuck to its guns despite enormous administrative pressure.”

Faculty members testified on behalf of Murphy during the 16-day trial. Murphy estimated that she has spent upward of $400,000 in legal fees so far.

Since she was fired, she has worked as the director of occupational medicine at Parkview Hospital in Riverside.

Although the trial has ended in her favor, Murphy said she was still willing to reduce the amount she would receive if the school would reinstate her and “restore my career.”

Chapman in Orange has 2,300 students and, according to the administration, a net worth of $53 million.

Asked if he thought that the college would appeal the decision, Murphy’s attorney, Dale L. Gronemeier of Los Angeles, said: “They can dig their hole deeper or they can make their peace with Dr. Murphy.”