A state judge has agreed to award Woodstock Police Chief Joe Swanson almost $3,400 in fees and expenses incurred while fighting efforts to demote him by municipal manager Eric Duffy.
Lawyers for Swanson and Duffy had sparred over whether the police chief was entitled to receive costs after a judge sided with Swanson.
Vermont Superior Court Judge H. Dickson Corbett said Tuesday the award of costs is normally made to the prevailing party in civil actions with discretion given to the court.
The five Woodstock Village Trustees voted 5-0 in April 2025 to uphold a decision by Duffy to demote Swanson. It followed a 14 1/2-hour marathon hearing on March 19, 2025. In an appeal to superior court, Judge Corbett eventually overturned the trustees.
Corbett noted “in this case, the parties disagree as to what it means to be the prevailing party in a situation where (1) the decision of the village trustees was reversed, but (2) petitioner did not obtain all the relief sought, and (3) the case has been remanded to the village trustees for further proceedings.”
In the end, Corbett awarded Swanson $3,393, including $3,094 for 591 pages of transcripts by a professional stenographer hired for the village demotion hearing.
Swanson had to hire his own certified stenographer for the hearing after the village trustees had refused to seek a verbatim transcript.
“The idea is that costs on appeal are awarded to an appellant who has successfully obtained reversal of lower-tribunal decision, regardless of whether the appellant succeed in obtaining all their requested relief, and regardless of whether there are further proceedings to be held on remand,” Corbett wrote.
“In this case, petitioner obtained reversal of the decision of the village trustees. For that reason, the court awards petitioner the costs allowable” under both the rules of both civil and appellate procedure.
Duffy did not respond to attempts to reach him for comment this week before the Standard’s press deadline.
Winning the fees was one of two victories this week by Swanson and his lawyer Linda Fraas, who is now part of the Woodstock law firm, Shillen Mackall Seldon Spicer & Fraas.
Fraas has maintained it was an ethical violation for Burlington lawyer John Klesch to represent Duffy and the village during the disciplinary hearing, while also representing village trustee chair Seton McIlroy, including in a separate $5 million lawsuit.
Judge Corbett has ruled the other four trustees were immune from the $5 million lawsuit, but McIlroy, because of some possible actions, might be liable.
Klesch has now proposed that Kendall Hoechst, a Burlington lawyer with the firm Dinse, be hired to represent Duffy in presenting his case to the trustees.
Klesch maintains he does not believe he has the ethical problem that Fraas seems to believe is an issue.
Fraas “has asserted that it is a violation of ethics rules for me/my law firm to represent management’s case concerning Chief Swanson in remand proceedings before the Trustees,” Klesch said in an email exchange this week.
“While I have determined this assertion is without merit, Municipal Manager Eric Duffy nonetheless proposes that alternative counsel represent management’s case to the Trustees,” he wrote.
Duffy understands that Hoechst’s legal fees would be covered by PACIF at the Vermont League of Cities and Towns, Klesch said.
PACIF is the Property and Casualty Intermunicipal Fund, a member-owned risk-sharing pool that exists for the sole benefit of Vermont municipal entities, according to the VLCT.
It will be up to the five village trustees to decide on whether to hire Hoechst for Duffy.
If she is hired, it may impact the new proposed date for the second Swanson hearing, Klesch said.
For more on this, please see our Jan. 22 edition of the Vermont Standard.
