A Superior Court Commissioner ruled that there is no state law to give back Jamie McCourt her role as CEO of the Los Angeles Dodgers.
“From an employment analysis, there’s no law that would support the court reinstating an employee,” said court commissioner Scott Gordon on Thursday morning.
Her husband, Frank McCourt, fired Jamie last month on the grounds that she was having an inappropriate relationship with an employee and was also doing a poor job as CEO.
Frank’s lawyers have presented the case that Jamie simply carried the title of CEO but did nothing in her time with the team as far being involved with organizational decisions.
They claim that she was trying to push her position as becoming a general manager someday, and was largely into promoting herself rather than what was best for the team.
“Her position has been largely ceremonial,” said Frank McCourt’s attorney, Mark Seltzer. “He makes the major decisions.”
Frank paid Jamie $500,000 as severance pay to cover her salary from Oct. 1-Dec. 31, and this push to regain her spot as CEO seems to be a last ditch attempt to take money from her husband before a separate hearing begins on Dec. 15.
Both Frank and Jamie sent a gauntlet of lawyers to the Los Angeles County courtroom, but neither was present for the ruling.
As for now, this case will go silent, but there is much to be decided in the upcoming months.
The smoking gun in the divorce proceedings is going to be a document signed by Frank and Jamie when they initially gained ownership of the club that outlined Frank as the sole owner of the team, while Jamie was the sole owner of the couple’s estate.
The agreement was drawn up to keep the couple’s personal assets separate from their business, but Jamie contests that she didn’t know the full scope of what she was signing.
Whether or not the judge rules that the team is “community property,” meaning that Frank and Jamie each hold ownership in the club, is yet to be decided.
That decision will be made over the course of a full trial.
If the team is deemed to be community property, then Jamie will regain access to the Dodgers’ organization.
If the team is given solely to Frank, it still might not be the end of Jamie as far as the Dodgers go, because the costly divorce could force Frank to sell the team in order to accommodate the lofty demands of Jamie in the separation proceedings.
This could spell disaster in the off-season for the Boys in Blue, who have hoards of players heading to arbitration, and a team in the flux of ownership may have a difficult time maneuvering the salaries of the club.
Andre Ethier, Jonathan Broxton, Chad Billingsley, Matt Kemp, James Loney, and Russell Martin are just a few of the big names up for arbitration for the Dodgers.
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