Rootenberg slams city, health unit board with lawsuit

Shaun Rootenberg has launched a multimillion-dollar lawsuit against the City of Sault Ste. Marie and Lee Mason (shown), the newly appointed chair of the Algoma Public Health board.

In a statement of claim filed this week with Ontario's Superior Court of Justice in Toronto, Rootenberg alleges defamation, negligence, negligent misrepresentation, injurious falsehood and lost business opportunities.

Rootenberg's claim, which has not yet been tested in court, claims that one of his first assignments after he was hired as APH's interim chief financial officer was to conduct an initial assessment of credit-card losses attributed to former chief operating officer Jeff Holmes.

Rootenberg claims he found that the health unit was depleting its cash reserves and was being forced to draw on its line of credit to meet payroll.

The Ontario government ordered a forensic audit and governance assessment of APH after it was revealed that Rootenberg did time at Beaver Creek minimum security prison in Gravenhurst from 2009 to 2011 for three convictions of fraud over $5,000.

"In large part because of the stigma in the Jewish community associated with Rootenberg's incarceration, following his release from incarceration and despite his qualifications for employment opportunities, Rootenberg found it difficult to find meaningful work as a result of the stigma associated with his name and being prejudged based on his conviction," the lawsuit says.

In 2013, Rootenberg applied to the Office of the Registrar General to change his name to Shaun Rothberg.

Since then, Rootenberg has used the Rothberg name when introducing himself for work purposes.

The lawsuit, filed under Rootenberg's name, contains a lengthy list of Rootenberg's accomplishments during his time at Algoma Public Health.

These, the lawsuit contends, include discovering that Jeff Holmes still had access to telephone and online banking for APH's bank accounts.

Rootenberg says he took immediate action to fix that.

Rootenberg's statement of claim alleges that information about him was leaked to the news media and that unfounded allegations were spread to deflect attention away from the poor way Rootenberg was being treated when he had done nothing wrong, had always handled himself in a professional and courteous manner and had left APH in much better shape than when he arrived.

The lawsuit alleges that because of the actions of the City of Sault Ste. Marie and Algoma Public Health, Rootenberg has been "subjected to intense media scrutiny, public ridicule and condemnation" and he has been unable to find employment.

As a result, Rootenberg says he lost millions of dollars in profit-sharing he was entitled to from the Algoma Medicinal Alliance marijuana grow-op, and millions more when he lost the Starbucks franchise he was planning to establish at the Algoma Public Health site.