Haverhill mayoral and School Committee candidate Scott W. Wood Jr. has dropped his state lawsuit against the city, but his Boston lawyer hinted Wednesday there could be other activity next week.
Attorney Sean R. Cronin last week notified Essex County Superior Court that he is now representing Wood and the next day asked the current case against the City of Haverhill, Haverhill Police Department, former interim Police Chief Anthony Haugh and current Police Chief Robert P. Pistone be dismissed without prejudice.
Reached by telephone, Cronin confirmed the dismissal, but suggested more information is forthcoming.
Wood filed suit in June, saying the resurfacing of a police “background investigation” of him more than a decade ago unfairly ended his employment as a police officer in both Haverhill and Wenham. His then-attorney, Suzanne L. Herold, charged city officials broke an agreement to “dispose of all copies of a background report” from 2013.
As long ago as the end of 2021, WHAV reported Wood did not appear to be working as a Haverhill police officer despite being sworn in during late October of 2020 in Mayor James J. Fiorentini’s office. WHAV filed a public records request at the time, but the city’s response was limited.
Haverhill’s outside lawyer, Michele E. Randazzo, earlier this month disputed Wood’s legal claim while responding to a WHAV public records request.
“Importantly, the city denies the allegations made by Mr. Wood that it or its employees acted improperly in conducting the background investigation in and around 2013. The city is confident that it will be established in the litigation that the contents of the 2013 background investigation are accurate and not false, as alleged by Mr. Wood, and further, that the city took sufficient efforts subsequent to 2013 to independently verify the very claims that Mr. Wood has publicly claimed are false,” she wrote.