Jan. 24—ROCHESTER — Mayo Clinic is asking Olmsted County’s Third Judicial Court to dismiss the three of five claims made by Dr. Michael Joyner in a lawsuit alleging that the clinic used “punitive” discipline actions against him for “problematic” statements to the media and as retaliation for his role in a whistleblowing report.

In documents filed this week, Mayo Clinic requested that the court dismiss Claims I, II and V of Joyner’s 2023 lawsuit because it claims that the clinic’s Academic Freedom and Anti-Retaliation policies are not binding contracts nor did a “handshake agreement” with Mayo Clinic guarantee “permanent employment.”

A hearing for Judge Kathy Wallace to listen to the motion has not yet been scheduled.

Joyner, an anesthesiologist and physiologist, has worked at Mayo Clinic since 1992 and continues to be employed by Mayo Clinic.

Mayo Clinic suspended Joyner for one week without pay in March 2023 and withheld a scheduled raise as well as curtailing his availability for media interviews. Joyner appealed his suspension. A committee of Mayo Clinic physician peers upheld the disciplinary action.

He filed the lawsuit in Olmsted County’s Third Judicial Court

on Nov. 13, 2023. Joyner alleges, among other things, that Mayo Clinic used “punitive” discipline actions against him for “problematic” statements to the media,

“unprofessional” behavior

and what he claims to be retaliation for his role in a 2020 whistleblowing report.

Joyner is requesting a jury trial. He seeks damages in an amount to be established during the trial, and for an order for Mayo Clinic to cease its interference with his style of communication.

Mayo Clinic argues that the first and second claims in the lawsuit — breach of contract and promissory estoppel — are not valid because “the Mayo Clinic policies and other documents on (which) the Plaintiff bases his claims did not constitute an offer to contract or a binding promise, as a matter of law; regardless Mayo Clinic did not violate the policies.” Promissory estoppel is legal doctrine that says parties may be liable for broken promises.

On the subject of Joyner’s fifth claim of tortious interference with a contract that identifies CEO Dr. Gianrico Farrugia and Dr. Carlos Mantilla as direct defendants, Mayo Clinic again claims that its policies are not contracts and argues that state law allows that “a party cannot interfere with its own contract.” That law includes corporate officers and managers acting on behalf of their employers. Mayo Clinic is requesting to have Farrugia and Mantilla dismissed as defendants, because any actions they took were on behalf of Mayo Clinic.

“Mayo cannot interfere with its own agreements, and the Amended Complaint is replete with allegations that Dr. Farrugia and Dr. Mantilla were acting on behalf of Mayo. Indeed, Dr. Joyner specifically alleges that Dr. Farrugia, Mayo’s CEO, was Mayo’s ultimate decision maker,” according to Mayo Clinic’s filing to dismiss the three claims.

Mayo Clinic’s motion does not address Joyner’s third and fourth claims.

His third claim is that Mayo Clinic violated Minnesota’s personnel record statute by not providing him with all of the documents in his personnel file, despite repeated requests.

Joyner claims the alleged violation of the personnel record statute caused him to suffer “a diminished professional reputation, a reduction in his ability to advance scientific research and share his research publicly, lost wages and pay increases, and diminished earning capacity in the future, and by causing Joyner substantial emotional distress.”

The fourth claim in the lawsuit is that Mayo Clinic violated Minnesota’s Whistleblower Act by retaliating against Joyner for reporting that employees of MITRE Corp., a McLean, Virginia-based nonprofit that Mayo Clinic was working with Joyner on convalescent plasma research, tried to illegally access Mayo Clinic patient data in 2020.

In the lawsuit, Joyner described the MITRE situation as occurring during the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic, when he was reportedly working “16-20 hours per day, often seven days per week for months” to keep up with his regular work at Mayo Clinic as well as leading research into convalescent plasma as a COVID treatment.

Joyner stated in his lawsuit that his report resulted in a formal complaint against MITRE. Mayo Clinic formally sanctioned MITRE in September 2020. Dr. John Noseworthy, who preceded Farrugia as Mayo Clinic’s CEO, is a MITRE board member.

“Farrugia became aware of Joyner’s reports regarding MITRE. Mayo was attempting to develop a profitable commercial business relationship with MITRE, and Farrugia was upset that Joyner’s reports might impact Mayo’s business plan” is how Joyner’s complaint described the situation.

In the wake of Joyner’s complaints about MITRE, he claims that Farrugia “weaponized” the disciplinary process and initiated a punishment and a letter of reprimand described Joyner’s actions as “unprofessional.” Joyner’s claims that the disciplinary action was “fueled in part by Farrugia’s known personal dislike for Joyner.”

In 2021, Joyner filed an internal retaliation complaint against Farrugia for the 2020 reprimand. That, he said, resulted in an additional reprimand against him for complaining and displaying a “lack of professionalism.”

While MITRE has not responded to Post Bulletin questions about the incident, the nonprofit did bring Joyner in to speak at a MITRE conference in December 2022 about the military national security implications of his human performance work.

Mayo Clinic has previously refuted Joyner’s claims and stated that the 2020 reprimand actually stemmed from Joyner making a demand for more compensation.

“Mayo intends to show that in 2020, in the heart of the COVID-19 pandemic, Dr. Joyner gave Mayo an ultimatum, demanding that Mayo agree to give him a seven-figure payment within 48 hours,” wrote Mayo Clinic’s Andrea Kalmanovitz.

Joyner stated that Farrugia had asked him to develop a business plan to make the convalescent plasma program into a profitable business for Mayo Clinic. Joyner stated in the complaint that he requested increased compensation for that additional workload.

Joyner’s attorney, Kellie Miller of Allen Harris Law, describes Mayo Clinic’s “ultimatum” comments as “false allegations” and that Farrugia resonded by “willfullly misconstruing Joyner’s request as a threat.”

Miller shared an email correspondence between Joyner and Farrugia from June 2021. Joyner described creating “a whole new book of business for Mayo” over a three-month period that generated $54 million and goodwill at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.