EKB News

Late Wednesday afternoon, former University of Kentucky men's basketball coach Billy Gillispie filed a multi-million dollar federal lawsuit in Dallas, Texas against the U.K. Athletics Association. The lawsuit accuses the association of breach of contract and fraud, and alleges, although Gillispie never signed a formal contract, he was operating under a memorandum of understanding and was terminated, without cause, two years into a seven year agreement. Gillispie is seeking $6 million he says is owed to him according to the memorandum he says stated, if fired, he would be paid $1.5 million a year for each remaining year. In addition, the suit alleges U.K. lured him away from Texas A&M when the university was negotiating a contract extension through 2015. Gillispie is seeking punitive damages, cost of attorney fees and a jury trial in Dallas. U.K. spokesman Jimmy Stanton says the lawsuit came as a surprise as university attorneys had been attempting to work out a settlement with Gillispie's attorneys and was continuing to negotiate a separation in good faith. The lawsuit alleges, although an actual contract was never signed, there were several instances when U.K. attorneys referred to the memorandum of understanding as the equivalent of a legally binding contract. U.K. President Lee Todd Jr. said at a news conference March 27th. he considered Gillispie to be working under a year-to-year contract, and U.K. had taken that stance because the beginning of the memorandum states a full seven year contract would be negotiated at the earliest possible date, which never happened.