By Michael Donoghue
Vermont News First
(A version of this story appeared in the Vermont Standard online earlier this week)
For the second time in less than a year, a Vermont court has overturned efforts by Municipal Manager Eric Duffy and the Village Trustees to demote Woodstock Police Chief Joe Swanson to a patrol officer.
The judge, citing a lack of due process, ordered on Tuesday the demotion appeal be sent back to the Village to try again before an “impartial board.”
But Swanson has decided that he is going to retire after serving 26 years with the Woodstock Police Department and will skip having a third hearing.
“Chief Swanson is pleased with the court’s reversal of the unlawful demotion and restoration to his status as chief,” his attorney Linda Fraas told the Vermont Standard on Tuesday.
“Chief Swanson will not be seeking a remand as he has chosen as of today to end his long career with the Woodstock PD and retire as Chief,” the Woodstock lawyer said.
The Vermont Standard first reported online Tuesday evening the court’s reversal and Swanson’s retirement.
Judge Kerry A. McDonald-Cady, in an eight-page ruling, said she needed to overturn the Village’s ruling due to the lack of due process provided to Swanson by Woodstock.
The judge focused on the refusal of Village Trustee Jeffrey Kahn, the vice chair, to step aside when she said he had an obvious conflict of interest centering on a road rage incident reviewed by Chief Swanson.
The judge said Swanson’s complaints of prejudice by two other Trustees, Brenda Blakeman and former Chair E. Seton McIlroy, did not rise high enough to overturn the appeal, but Kahn was a different story.
A second legal action — a multi-million dollar civil lawsuit filed by Swanson against Duffy, McElroy, Interim Police Chief Chris O’Keeffe, the Village and town — will continue in Vermont Superior Court in Woodstock.
“The wrongful demotion, breach of contract, intentional infliction of distress, and discrimination claims against Mr. Duffy, the Village, the Town, Ms. McIlroy and Sgt. O’Keeffe will continue to be litigated in the civil suit,” Fraas said.
The case has been somewhat at a standstill, according to Fraas, because attorney John Klesch, on behalf of the defendants, except the town, has not provided any records.
Swanson, in his retirement letter to Duffy, said, “Effective immediately, I am tendering my resignation and instituting my retirement from the Village police department, which I have faithfully served since June of 2000.”
He wrote, “If any person contacts any member of the Village of Woodstock or Town of Woodstock concerning my status, such members are required to confirm that I retired voluntarily and in good standing.”
Attempts to reach Swanson were unsuccessful.
In one of his final actions, Swanson said he was having the department issue him the same type of retirement badge and I.D. that were provided to outgoing Village Police Chief Robbie Blish in 2023 when Duffy was manager. Swanson said retiring Woodstock Police Chiefs have received such badges since at least 2000.
It was unclear if there would be the traditional ceremony to present a police chief with his credentials and badge.
Attempts to reach Duffy by email and text were unsuccessful on Tuesday. An automatic email response said he was planning to be out of the office on Wednesday and not checking emails.
Duffy said for time-sensitive issues to reach out to Assistant Town Manager David Green or Chief of Staff Stephanie Appelfeller, but neither responded by the Standard’s deadline on Wednesday.
Kahn was the lone current trustee to offer a comment before the deadline on Wednesday.
“The judge ruled on the “potential” for bias in the Swanson case. I unequivocally state that I have held no personal bias toward Joe Swanson before, during, or after the hearings,” Kahn said in an email.
The Standard also reached out to Blakeman and the current chair Lisa Lawlor, two other trustees who remain on the board and participated in the decision, but did not hear back. McIlroy also did not respond.
O’Keeffe said on Wednesday he was unable to comment.
“Thanks for reaching out. I cannot comment due to ongoing litigation,” he said in an email.
McDonald-Cady said Swanson’s claims of bias or animus by Trustees Blakeman and McIlroy “do not underlie this decision.”
She said Blakeman’s profane hand gesture to Swanson’s husband while he stood outside her hair salon and video recorded Interim Chief O’Keeffe getting a haircut while on duty “does not demonstrate actual bias nor the appearance of bias that Ms. Blakeman has towards the Petitioner.
While Ms. Blakeman’s actions demonstrated her dislike of Mr. Seldon, that is not sufficient to demonstrate bias towards the Petitioner, even when considering he and Mr. Seldon are married,” the judge wrote.
The judge said that McIlroy being named by Swanson as a defendant in the separate civil lawsuit in her capacity as a Village Trustee did not demonstrate her bias or appearance of bias towards the chief. Judge H. Dickson Corbett had ruled earlier that four trustees were immune from the civil lawsuit, but McIlroy needed to remain a defendant based on her conduct toward Swanson.
“However, the Court finds Mr. Kahn’s participation is problematic,” the judge wrote. “Although the disqualification standards are thus generous, and the decisionmaker enjoys a presumption of impartiality, … the conclusion is unavoidable here that — at a minimum — the appearance of fairness was compromised by the participation of” Kahn, the judge said.
McDonald-Cady noted the record demonstrated that in July 2024 the Village Trustees considered Swanson as a police chief “who was satisfactorily performing his duties which then changed in March 2025 to an opinion that Petitioner’s misconduct was so egregious that he had to be removed from his position and demoted to a patrol officer.”
The judge said one event that contributed to the Village Trustees’ shift in opinion was learning that on November 8, 2023, Swanson shared with his husband six videos of a road rage incident that Trustee Kahn was personally involved in as one of the drivers.
The road rage video was obtained through the Woodstock Police investigation. The evidence was presented to the trustees during both Swanson hearings in March 2025 and March 2026 and was included in the Village Trustees’ decision as part of the basis of good cause to demote the police chief.
The Village Trustees asserted in their decision that, “The content of the video was not relevant to any component of Manager Duffy’s effort to impose discipline. The issue was Mr. Swanson’s sharing of law enforcement investigative materials with a family member.”
The court went on to say, “What the Court finds salient is that Trustee Kahn himself was the subject of the videos which depicted his personal involvement in a traffic incident arising from alleged unsafe driving by Mr. Kahn and another driver sparked by road rage resulting in both drivers receiving traffic tickets from a Woodstock police officer who responded.”
The judge added, “The Court agrees that the content of the videos is not relevant to the issue of whether Petitioner committed a violation of his duties as a law enforcement officer by sharing investigative work product with a family member. Instead, the content of the videos is relevant as to whether Trustee Kahn could be an impartial decision-maker to determine the consequence of Petitioner’s employment status when the video sharing by him was part of the evidence for Trustee Kahn to consider.”
Swanson testified at both hearings before the trustees and in writing that he had shared the video with his husband, Woodstock lawyer Nicholas “Nico” Seldon, to get a legal opinion about the actions of both drivers and if anybody should face court action.
Swanson said Seldon had offered legal advice to the police department in the past, including to now-retired Chief Robbie Blish, who confirmed it.
Swanson also said on Tuesday he wants his work record cleared.
Swanson, in a separate letter sent to Duffy, said the manager must “immediately remove from my personnel file any and all: (1) written reprimands; (2) written notices of verbal reprimands, and (3) written notice of future reprimands, which were written by any subordinate officer, including Mr. O’Keeffe.”
The chief said he had a spotless record until Duffy and O’Keeffe sought to oust him.
“Since 2000, I faithfully served the Woodstock Village Police Department without any attacks on my skills, knowledge, training, judgment or competence and with an exemplary personnel file until you and my subordinate officer — Christopher O’Keeffe — engaged in a joint enterprise to illegally oust me for purely personal reasons,” Swanson wrote.
“As the Vermont Superior Court has now recognized for the second time, I have never ceased being the Chief of Police for the Woodstock Village Police Department. Therefore, I have always served as a superior officer to Mr. O’Keeffe and, as such, he has never had any authority to reprimand me under any circumstances,” Swanson wrote.
“As you know, Mr. O’Keeffe did not begin to sully my Personnel file with bogus accusations until I sued him,” Swanson wrote.
He said O’Keeffe had no authority to start a now controversial internal investigation concerning a high-speed crash by an intoxicated teen driver, who was found dead 17 hours later more than a quarter mile away after wading through a chilly Ottauquechee River in November 2025.
“Furthermore, the Vermont Superior Court first reinstated me on 12/2/2025 and, as such, Mr. O’Keeffe lacked all authority to initiate an Internal Investigation on any matter, including the Ben Johnsen complaint, which the evidence record shows that he initiated after hand-selecting an ‘investigator’ who lacked police experience,” he said.
CSC Investigations in Cornwall, which was hired by Duffy last December, was formed by three lawyers, Tamara Chase, Nancy Sheahan, and Ellen “Nell” Coogan.
Duffy has refused to release a copy of the June report, which was sent to the Vermont Criminal Justice Council. The council sent a letter to Swanson saying it was not taking any action based on his performance in that internal investigation.
Swanson said in a letter to Duffy the entire CSC investigative file, including all interviews, notes, and reports, needs to be removed from the chief’s personnel file.
“Through my attorney, I have previously notified you of your failure to follow the WPD Internal Affairs Policy in numerous substantive ways, including your failure to follow the policy’s express requirement for a conclusion to issue within 180 days; the failure to follow the policy results in an automatic Exonerated finding,” Swanson wrote on Tuesday.
“You are expected to comply with the above instructions by close of business today,” the retiring chief said.