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Market Basket seeks restraining order against fired execs, Demoulas allies
The grocery chain alleges one of its former executives sneaked into Market Basket headquarters last week. He denies doing anything inappropriate.
Market Basket’s boardroom brawl escalated Monday as the company filed for a restraining order against two former executives, accusing one of them of breaking into its headquarters after he was ousted for allegedly stoking a “campaign of intimidation and defiance” on behalf of suspended CEO Arthur T. Demoulas.
Filed in Middlesex Superior Court, the civil complaint names former Director of Operations Joseph Schmidt and former Store and Grocery Director Tom Gordon, two Demoulas allies who were fired last month amid the grocery chain’s increasingly fraught power struggle.
Now, Market Basket is asking a judge to bar Schmidt and Gordon from setting foot on company property. A hearing in the case is scheduled for Thursday at 10 a.m.
Food fight:
Both men were initially placed on leave back in May amid allegations they were planning a disruption of Market Basket’s operations and pressuring company associates into a potential work stoppage, according to the complaint. Demoulas was also suspended at the time.
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Schmidt and Gordon further sought “to instill fear among current Market Basket associates that after they are restored to their prior positions, associates who cooperated with Market Basket management in their absence will be targeted for retribution,” the complaint continues. “Their goal in waging this campaign is to encourage associates to slow down their work, or even walk off the job, and to pressure Market Basket management to reinstate them and Mr. Demoulas.”
Justine Griffin, a spokesperson for Demoulas, called the complaint against Schmidt and Gordon “outrageous” and took aim at both the Market Basket board and the law firm hired to investigate the work stoppage allegations.
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“In a continuation of the board and Quinn Emmanuel’s scorched earth tactics, they sent this complaint to the media before Joe and Tom were even aware of it,” Griffin added. “This gameplaying needs to stop — they are messing with the lives of real people. And they are lying.”
Schmidt, for his part, has rejected claims that anyone was plotting a strike.
According to Market Basket, even though they were instructed multiple times to stay off company property, Schmidt and Gordon stopped by dozens of supermarket locations to speak with employees as part of a “concerted, multi-pronged campaign to sow doubt, create uncertainty,” and possibly spur a consumer boycott.
“You are acting as if you want to get fired for insubordination,” three of the company’s board members wrote in final warning letters before terminating the pair.
However, Griffin disputed the company’s claims that Schmidt and Gordon were acting with sinister intent, explaining, “Joe and Tom were fired after spending their entire careers at Market Basket. They found the hardest thing was not just the very public false accusations and continued attacks on their integrity, but it was that they were separated from their colleagues and friends whom they have known for decades.”
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Griffin added: “Once fired, they both decided to check in on their long-time colleagues, visiting stores and just trying to be a positive, reassuring figures in the turmoil.”
The company further alleges Schmidt secretly held onto his master keys when he was fired and surreptitiously entered Market Basket’s headquarters in Tewksbury after-hours last Thursday. According to the complaint, security footage shows Schmidt taping photos of Demoulas to the windows of the company car in which he arrived, then entering the building through a side entrance.
Security camera footage purportedly showed Schmidt walking into Market Basket’s corporate offices through the warehouse, though the company said it’s unclear exactly what he did in the roughly six minutes he spent there. The Tewksbury Police Department said it did not receive a report of the alleged incident.
Schmidt returned his company car to the office last Thursday as requested, according to Griffin.
“While there, he went to visit briefly a couple of colleagues in the warehouse and office,” she added. “They exchanged well wishes and he left without incident or doing anything inappropriate.”
Market Basket Director Steven J. Collins said in a statement the company is seeking a restraining order “to enforce what we have already requested in writing: stay away from Market Basket property and leave associates alone.”
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The complaint also asks that Schmidt be forced to hand over any master keys in his possession.
Schmidt and Gordon “lost the privilege of being employed by Market Basket based upon recent past behavior,” Collins continued. “This conduct by ‘men of integrity and honor,’ in the words of suspended CEO Arthur T. Demoulas, goes way beyond ordinary loyalty to a job or a boss. It is against the law and crosses the line of acceptable behavior.”
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