COVID-19 vaccine-refusing troopers get more time for case against Massachusetts State Police

Both the Massachusetts State Police and the former troopers suing for being suspended allegedly for refusing COVID-19 vaccination will have more time to prepare in the long-running suit.

The parties last met in federal court in Boston in January, but this week filed a joint request for extending prep time, an ask that U.S. District Judge Leo T. Sorokin approved.

The suit was first filed in November 2022 by three former or suspended troopers: Middlesex County’s Jessie Barbosa, a 4-year member of the force at the time who was put on unpaid leave; and former Worcester County troopers Robert Johnson and Darren Specht, former troopers who served for 21 and 29 years respectively at the time of suit. These three were later joined by 26 others.

In short, Barbosa, Johnson and Specht claimed that the MSP concocted reasons to get rid of the troopers who refused then-Gov. Charlie Baker’s order that all executive branch employees be vaccinated and maintain “full vaccination” as a condition of employment.

The plaintiffs claim that medical or religious exemptions were set into the order, but the MSP had no intention of providing exemptions.

“In sum, MSP attempted to evade liability for discriminating against Plaintiffs by frivolously asserting Plaintiffs engaged in ‘employee misconduct’ when in reality, they merely exercised their fundamental right to Free Exercise and remained steadfast in their sincerely held religious beliefs,” the plaintiffs wrote in their lawsuit.

The plaintiffs say that they are “religious persons” who refuse to engage in anything related to abortion. They cite the use of fetal stem cell lines used in the production of COVID-19 vaccinations as reason to hold to their religious objections.

“But MSP did not care about Plaintiffs constitutionally protected freedoms; rather, MSP [prioritized its] insatiable (and arbitrary) appetite to hold itself out as a 100% vaccinated department above all else,” the plaintiffs wrote.

In response to the amended complaint — which includes the latter plaintiffs — the MSP wrote a lot of “can neither admit nor deny the contents of any documents” cited in the complaint and denied all allegations on a paragraph-by-paragraph basis.

“Plaintiffs’ claims are barred, in whole or in part, because the Department’s actions were at all times proper, lawful, reasonable, and in conformity with all applicable federal and state statutory, regulatory, and decisional law,” the MSP wrote as one of its 14 affirmative defenses, which also said that some of the claims are also barred because of the statute of limitations.

The approved joint stipulation states that the parties already discussed a schedule that imposes deadlines of May 1 for expert depositions and all Rule 56 motions must be served by Aug. 1.