L.A. and Horace Mann Insurance Company v. Board of Education of the City of Trenton, Mercer County (073401)

We are called upon to determine whether N.J.S.A. 18A:16-6 entitles a school board employee to indemnification for attorney’s fees and costs spent in defense of a civil action arising from the same allegations contained in a dismissed criminal indictment. We conclude that in such circumstances N.J.S.A. 18A:16-6 requires indemnification unless there is proof by a preponderance of the evidence that the employee’s conduct fell outside the course of performance of his or her employment duties.

Here, rather than conducting an evidentiary hearing, the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) disposed of the…