A former Utah firefighter is suing her supervisors, the town and the county they worked in, saying the assistant fire chief who allegedly raped her was protected from discipline — allowing further abuse for years — because his father was both the fire chief and a sheriff’s deputy.
The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in Utah’s U.S. District Court, alleges Austin Corry sexually harassed the woman soon after she started at the Kanosh Volunteer Fire Department and that the abuse continued until Corry, an assistant fire chief, was arrested in September.
The Salt Lake Tribune generally does not identify victims of sexual abuse.
Aside from quitting her job, the lawsuit said the woman’s only recourse was reporting to Corry’s direct supervisor, his father, Scott Corry.
“As might be expected, Plaintiff’s complaints to the Fire Chief about his son’s egregious behavior were dismissed out of hand with instructions to ‘not be alone with [Austin],’" the lawsuit said.
The allegations were further quashed, the lawsuit says, because Scott Corry was a sergeant with the Millard County Sheriff’s Office, the agency that would investigate the accusations.
Austin Corry was investigated by the Utah County Sheriff’s Office and charged in 2018 in two rape cases concerning the woman and another woman who alleges she was raped when delivering cookies to him at the fire department.
Before those allegations came to light, the lawsuit filed by the female firefighter alleges, Austin Corry’s “sexual behavior escalated and became violent." He is accused of raping that woman three times at the fire department, according to the lawsuit. He was charged in September with two counts of rape, two counts of object rape, five counts of forcible sexual abuse and five counts of sexual battery.
In the case involving the second woman, he was charged with one count of felony rape.
Millard County Sheriff Richard Jacobson didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment, but according to the Millard County Chronicle Progress, Scott Corry stopped working at the sheriff’s office in October.
It’s unclear if Scott Corry is still the Kanosh Fire Department chief. Attempts to reach the fire station and Kanosh Mayor Frank Paxton were unsuccessful.
The female firefighter claims the alleged conduct by the father and son violated her rights to equal protection and substantive due process. She also accuses Austin Corry of false imprisonment, intentional infliction of emotional distress, battery and sexual assault. She also filed two claims of negligent hiring, supervision and/or retention, one against Kanosh and one against Millard County.
She is seeking more than $300,000, in addition to harassment, discrimination and retaliation training for Kanosh Town Fire Department and Kanosh town employees; an independent hotline and service for victims of sexual abuse to come forward; and a mandate to investigate all claims of harassment or discrimination against the fire department.
Attempts to reach representatives from Millard County were unsuccessful. Attorneys for Austin Corry and the plaintiff also didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment Friday.
Austin Corry is scheduled to appear in court in connection with his criminal rape cases on April 10.
