Over the last 11 months, a six-figure payment made by Baltimore County to Patrick H. Murray, former chief of staff to ex-County Executive Johnny Olszewski, has been shrouded in mystery.

The case began with the county suing “Employee A” (Murray), but ended up last June with the Kathy Klausmeier administration paying Employee A’s lawyers $100,000.

That payment was made despite an independent report that “substantiated abuse and/or misconduct” by Murray, according to a complaint by the county’s attorney.

Specifically, Murray was said to have tried to interfere with then-Inspector General Kelly Madigan’s investigation of possible collusion between the Olszewski administration and developer David Cordish to bypass zoning rules so he could build a tennis barn at his estate.

These and other issues remains unanswered, despite an order last Friday by Judge Dennis M. Robinson Jr. that the records of Baltimore County, Maryland v. Employee A be unsealed “in its entirety upon the docketing of this order.”

As of today (June 3), the independent report by law firm Saul Ewing, as well as the settlement terms between Murray and the Klausmeier administration, remain “restricted information” barred from public inspection.

County Attorney James R. Benjamin Jr., who has been intimately involved in the whole saga, expressed surprise when notified that the documents remain confidential.

“It is my understanding the [Saul Ewing] report is an attachment to the complaint and to the amended complaint filed in the case,” he told The Brew.

Yes, it is. But the report could not be accessed.

Klausmeier spokesman Dakarai Turner said the county executive was aware of the Saul Ewing report, but is “unable to release it.” He suggested that a reporter talk the matter over with the judge.

Madigan, who is now inspector general for Howard County, said she “assumed the full case was to be unsealed,” including the Saul Ewing report.

Acting Baltimore County IG Steve Quisenberry said the same.

The lead private attorney for the county, Ernest Cornbrooks IV, didn’t respond to The Brew.

What this all amounts to, says Frederick Homan, is “an active effort across county government to keep this information quiet and to protect Johnny Olszewski.”

Homan, who retired as county administrator in 2018 and has since become a thorn in the side of local politicians, filed a Maryland Public Information lawsuit last September to permit inspection of the case record. His request was denied by the court.

“Murray wasn’t approaching Kelly Madigan for himself. He had orders,” Homan told The Brew this week, pointing out that the April 2024 sealing of the lawsuit by Circuit Court Judge Keith R. Truffer came at the same time that Olszewski was running for Congress.

Closed-door Battleground

The origins of the lawsuit date back to 2021 when Inspector General Madigan, charged with rooting out fraud, waste and abuse in county government, looked into a complaint that Cordish, chairman of The Cordish Companies and a Olszewski campaign contributor, had been given special treatment on his application to build an oversized tennis barn on his Green Spring Valley estate.

According to information unsealed on Friday, Murray asked to meet with Madigan at a Towson cafe shortly after her office requested access to emails from a county employee involved in the permitting process.

Madigan left the meeting convinced that “Employee A (Murray) was attempting to influence and shut down the investigation into the tennis facility,” wrote attorney Cornbrooks, and immediately reported the conversation to Quisenberry, her deputy.

(Murray later claimed he had no knowledge of the Cordish investigation and was only giving Madigan friendly advice about her “investigative techniques,” which he said made some employees “uncomfortable” and “were interfering with the day-to-day operations of county government.”)

“The OIG determined,” Cornbrooks continued in the lawsuit, “that an investigation needed to be conducted into whether Employee A’s actions at the eatery constituted a violation of the County Code falling within the OIG’s purview. As the inspector general was a witness with respect to what occurred on March 30, 2021, the OIG attempted to utilize the City of Baltimore’s Office of the Inspector General to conduct an investigation into Employee A’s actions at the eatery.”

Murray, through counsel, objected to using the Baltimore OIG.

In July 2022, Madigan released a report that concluded that Cordish had indeed received preferential treatment from the county. The IG described how a high-ranking official, identified by the Baltimore Sun as Deputy County Administrative Officer Drew Vetter, shepherded the application over the objections of Permits, Approvals and Inspections Director Michael Mallinoff.

Vetter tendered his resignation within days. On August 3, 2022, it was announced that Murray was also leaving the administration, with Olszewski praising his top aide as “an invaluable partner.”

Six months later, county attorney Benjamin and Murray’s lawyer, Andrew D. Levy, agreed to a county-funded “impartial and independent” investigation of the breakfast meeting and related matters by Saul Ewing LLP.

Saul Ewing completed the report in November 2023. It found no misconduct on the part of Madigan, but did “substantiat[e] abuse and/or misconduct by Employee A,” according to Cornbrooks. The report was forwarded by Madigan’s office to Olszewski’s office for an official response, but otherwise kept secret per OIG policies and procedures.

A month later, Levy notified Benjamin that the report constituted “a confidential personnel record” under the Maryland Public Information Act (MPIA) and, if publicly released as Madigan had urged the administration to do, would result in a lawsuit from Murray.

In the meantime, the Baltimore County Council approved legislation that granted independent legal representation for the inspector general “when necessary to avoid conflict of interest or the appearance of a conflict.”

Benjamin then used that authority to hire Karpinski, Cornbrooks & Karp, who filed the “Employee A” lawsuit, asking the court to declare that the Saul Ewing report did not constitute personnel records and did not violated the former employee’s right to privacy.

The case went before Circuit Court Judge Truffer, who ordered the county to “deny any request made pursuant to the Maryland Public Information Act for records related to the above-captioned matter.”

The Saul Ewing report was attached to the county’s lawsuit, but was “restricted” to the immediate parties in the case.

Murray countersued, claiming his rights under the 14th amendment and the MPIA would be violated by publication of the Saul Ewing report.

A History of Scandals

Last Friday, Judge Robinson vacated Truffer’s order, adding a curious footnote: “This order should not be construed as an indication that the judge who entered the Sealing Order and MPIA Order should or should not have entered those orders.”

Regardless of the apparent plain language of the order, the Saul Ewing report remains sealed. So do the terms of the $100,000 settlement the county made with Murray.

According to Homan, signing the sealed settlement, whose existence was unknown to the public until an August 2025 Baltimore Banner article, was an easy way to get rid of a lawsuit that threatened a politician who skirted around other scandals while county executive.

They included the Olszewski administration’s spending of $500,000 in an unsuccessful effort to conceal the facts underlying a questionable $83,675 payment to Philip Tirabassi, a former county firefighter with family and business connections to Olszewski, and his administration’s efforts to help a campaign contributor win approval for the Eagle Trash Transfer Station in eastern Baltimore County.

In the later case, Murray requested that the county police investigate a former employee who turned out to be the whistleblower in the IG’s never-published investigation of the Eagle Trash case. Murray accused the retired employee of improperly gaining access to a county building and removing county property.

The investigation ended without charges when it turned out the former employee was given permission to enter the building, and the box seen in his hands on a security camera contained copies of records he had been allowed to make.

Diverging Paths

Olszewski and Klausmeier have denied that they made any side deals about the inspector general’s office in return for Olszewski’s support of her appointment as his successor. The congressman is now set to win the June 23 Democratic primary for a second term in Maryland’s 2nd District.

An avid critic of President Donald Trump, Olszewski recently introduced the Pardon Integrity Act, a proposed constitutional amendment to establish congressional oversight over presidential pardons and commutations.

Madigan, meanwhile, is gone. Two months before the $100,000 Murray settlement, Klausmeier told Madigan that she would not be reappointed and should resign.

Madigan instead applied for the IG position and was listed as a finalist for the position. Klausmeier passed over Madigan in favor of a federal auditor whose credentials were misrepresented in a press release.

The public uproar over the selection process ended with the county council voting down Klausmeier’s candidate, and Madigan’s continuing as a holdover IG until a new county executive was elected.

Last December, Madigan resigned to accept the newly created position of inspector general for Howard County.

Murray now serves at the top echelon of Frederick County government as chief of staff for County Executive Jessica Fitzwater.