Copyright © 2020 Albuquerque Journal

A tenured University of New Mexico professor who was suspended for all of 2020 after UNM found he violated sexual harassment and Title IX policies has taken the fight to return to his job to state district court.

Nick Flor, an associate professor at UNM’s Anderson School of Management, filed a lawsuit against UNM, its Board of Regents and other university officials on New Year’s Eve, the day before his yearlong suspension without pay went into effect.

He said the university violated his due process rights during its investigation into a relationship between Flor and a graduate student, which found Flor violated university policies, according to the lawsuit. Flor denied that he violated any policies, and his attorney said he wasn’t given a fair chance to defend himself.

Flor is also seeking a temporary restraining order preventing the suspension from going into effect while the case is pending, said Nicholas Hart, Flor’s attorney.

The suspension also prohibits Flor from working elsewhere for more than 39 days during the yearlong suspension.

“It is just unfathomable to me that a tenured professor could have this type of suspension – it’s essentially a termination – and have no hearing at all,” Hart said.

University officials declined to comment on Flor’s case, or say how common it is for a professor to receive a yearlong suspension.

In the suit, Flor admits exchanging “flirtatious and explicit in nature” emails with the graduate student, identified as Jane Doe, in 2018. At one point, the two talked about paid research opportunities available to the student, but she rejected them, according to the lawsuit.

Flor said he never taught, did research with or supervised the student, and they only had a brief in-person interaction in May 2018.

He said in the lawsuit that after he cut off all communication with Jane Doe, she threatened to share their emails with Flor’s supervisor and other administrators at the university.

The graduate student, in a petition for a restraining order against Flor, which was dismissed, said there was a power imbalance between her and Flor.

“I am a graduate student at (UNM) and have no power authority of this instructor,” she wrote in the August 2018 court filing. “This inherent power differential gives professor Flor the ability to harm, harass and hurt me.”

The matter was investigated by the university’s Office of Equal Opportunity, which determined that Flor violated university policies concerning “quid pro quo sexual harassment” and Title IX. But Flor said he didn’t get a chance to challenge the findings.

Flor’s lawsuit refers to Camille Carey, the vice dean of the law school, as the “party that imposed the sanction,” which Flor is seeking to undo.

The university’s “actions and inactions described above were fundamentally unfair to plaintiff, unduly prone to false findings of sexual harassment and policy violations, and were arbitrary and capricious,” the suit contends. The university’s “conduct was so egregious as to shock the conscience.”

Flor unsuccessfully appealed the suspension to UNM President Garnett Stokes and then the Board of Regents, which in June denied the appeal.

The lawsuit is seeking an order preventing UNM from imposing the suspension and disclosing Flor’s employment records reflecting his policy violations. It is also seeking the violations be expunged from his employment records and other damages.

Flor is still trying to appeal the suspension internally through a peer review process that is available to tenured faculty, Hart said.