From the department of bold moves…
Former Bell, California city manager Robert Rizzo is suing the city for stopping payment on his $1.5 million salary and benefits, which Rizzo allegedly inflated using public funds.
Rizzo, last seen getting fired from his volunteer job as a parking attendant at the International Surfing Museum in Huntington Beach, filed suit in Los Angeles Superior Court on Monday. He claims that he’s owed salary and benefits, with interest, from July 2010 on, because he did not resign and was not convicted of a felony related to the scandal, the AP reports.
“The City Council locked Rizzo out of his office and stopped paying Rizzo his salary and benefits due to him under his employment agreement,” the lawsuit says.
Rizzo and seven other city officials are charged with fraud and misappropriation of public funds for allegedly using public funds to pad their salaries for jobs that required once-a-month meetings. Rizzo was banking $787,637 by the time the city stopped his salary last July, plus benefits that put the grand total at nearly $1.5 million. He pleaded not guilty to the charges.
“Rizzo’s lawsuit is just another example of the gross disregard he has had towards all the working families in Bell and is just another distraction from the injustices Bell residents suffered under Rizzo,” said Bell Mayor Ali Saleh of the lawsuit.
