A New York State Supreme Court judge has ruled against Cazenovia funeral home director Brian Tait’s attempts to sue the state department of health over what Tait claims was a deal to suspend his funeral directing license for six months and seek no further administrative actions against him.
According to the New York State Unified Court System website, the motion to dismiss filed by the state was granted on March 31 by State Supreme Court Judge Hugh A. Gilbert.
In finding against Tait’s Article 78 suit against the DOH, filed in January, Gilbert decided that Tait and the DOH never had an agreed upon-deal over Tait’s license suspension, thereby leaving the field open for the department to pursue more severe administrative actions against the Cazenovia funeral home director, namely, to revoke his license altogether and decertify his funeral home.
Attorneys for both Tait and the Department of Health were not available for comment by press time.
The issue stems from Tait’s 2012 arrest and conviction for misdemeanor sexual abuse and endangering the welfare of a child charges brought against him by multiple female former employees who claimed Tait, owner of Tait Funeral Home at 2333 Fenner Road, subjected them to inappropriate physical exams. He pleaded guilty in July 2012 and was sentenced to three years of probation beginning in September 2012.
Independent from the criminal case, the DOH has the authority to regulate funeral directing licenses and, in September 2013, Tait was informed that the department was investigating him. In July 2014, after negotiating with the DOH, Tait announced on his funeral home’s website that he had reached an agreement with the department in which his license to practice as a funeral home director would be suspended for six months. Under the agreement, no further administrative actions would be taken against him by the department.
In October 2014, the DOH filed notice that it had “opted to pursue” a complete revocation of Tait’s funeral director’s license and funeral home certification. Attorneys for Tait and the DOH appeared in state supreme court Thursday, March 5, to argue their cases in front of Judge Gilbert.
During the March 5 arguments in state supreme court in the Onondaga County Courthouse, Tait’s attorney, Steven Ward Williams, of the Smith Sovick law firm, argued that Tait had a “binding agreement” with a senior DOH attorney on the six-month license suspension, and after nine months of negotiations and an extensive correspondence.
Assistant Attorney General Patricia M. Bordonaro argued for the state that the case should be dismissed because the DOH senior attorney who agreed to the deal had no authority to do so and only the commissioner of the Department of Health himself could authorize such an agreement. She said the DOH general counsel rejected the settlement proposal based on “a number of policy grounds” and instead chose to seek revocation his Tait’s personal license and his funeral home certification.
Under DOH regulations, Tait would be able to argue against that decision in a DOH administrative hearing, and this is the process that should be allowed to occur, she said. If Tait is not happy with the administrative outcome, then he is free to bring an Article 78 proceeding in state court, Bordonaro said.
Jason Emerson is editor of the Cazenovia Republican. He can be reached at [email protected].
