For months, if not years, the former commissioners of the now-defunct East Derry Fire Precinct have waited for this moment.

Now it may actually have arrived.

The New Hampshire Supreme Court in June turned down former East Derry fire chief John Nadeau’s appeal of its May 11 opinion. On that date in May, the Supreme Court upheld a lower court decision reversing the severance agreement paid Nadeau by the precinct.

Now, according to David Milz, the last chairman of the East Derry Fire Precinct commission, it’s time to get the Derry Town Council to take action against Nadeau to make him repay the severance package he received.

“We had requested time on the Town Council agenda for the July 10 meeting,” Milz said. “Then we heard from the town on Tuesday (June 26) that Nadeau had appealed. The next day, (former East Derry commissioner) David McPherson discovered the court had denied the request for appeal.

Milz said last week that former East Derry commissioner Joel Olbricht will again seek a place on the July 10 agenda. “I turned it back to Joel and said, ‘let’s get back on the agenda and find out what the town is going to do about this,” he said.

He hopes the town will go after the money, and doubts Nadeau, rumored to be living in Florida now, will take the case to the federal level.

When the Supreme Court denied the appeal in May, Milz told the Nutfield News, “If it were in my hands, I’d proceed. I’d be terribly disappointed if they chose not to proceed.” His views about Town Council action haven’t changed since then.

As reported earlier, according to the court case, Nadeau began negotiating for a job in Massachusetts in the fall of 2004. According to his contract, if he resigned, he would get three weeks pay and all accrued leave. But if East Derry terminated his contract as chief, Nadeau would get nine months pay and accumulated time earned.

The court found that Nadeau, together with then-East Derry fire commissioner Alan Lundblad, was found to have crafted a separation agreement terminating his own employment, so he could receive the larger severance. The Supreme Court agreed with the trial court that the severance package had been negotiated in bad faith by Lundblad and Nadeau.

Lundblad, who did not appeal the lower court decision and who received no money from the fire district from the severance, has since reimbursed the Derry Fire Department $12,000, what was agreed on for his part in pushing through the severance agreement.

That leaves Nadeau on the hook for about $78,000, Milz said, considering the severance agreement totaled just under $90,000.

In declining in May to reverse the lower court, the Supreme Court said, “considerable evidence of fraud and misrepresentation was found by the trial court, including: the formulation of a plan by Nadeau and Lundblad to engineer the higher severance pay; Lundblad’s admissions to (East Derry) counsel; a ruse by Lundblad to conceal the real reason for the November 23, 2004 meeting from the third commissioner; and the failure of Nadeau and Lundblad to reveal Nadeau’s imminent employment opportunity to the cooperating commissioner.”

The decision cites notes from the precinct’s attorney stating Lundblad had said “the Chief and I are going to take it down,” referring to the precinct, and that Nadeau’s resignation would be handled “under the guise” of a performance evaluation at the Nov. 23 meeting.

The trial court called Nadeau an “active participant in the scheme,” indeed, the first to contact the precinct’s lawyer and propose the language of the separation agreement.

As the Supreme Court opinion states, “The separation agreement was prepared by attorneys with Nadeau’s direct input and signed by him and two of the three commissioners during a meeting at which the third commissioner was absent... Shortly (after the agreement was signed), the two commissioners.... resigned.”

The court also found sufficient evidence that Nadeau had obtained the Massachusetts job as of Nov. 23, 2004, based on a deposition from a person involved in that hiring, and a congratulatory call to Nadeau from a firefighter on the morning of Nov. 23.

When Lundblad made his payment, the East Derry precinct had already dissolved, meaning it was too late for the money to be returned to East Derry taxpayers. As the East Derry Fire Department had earlier merged with the Derry Fire Department, any money collected from Nadeau now would go to the Derry Fire Department.

And as the fire precinct has been dissolved, the matter now rests with the Town Council, with any legal action handled by town attorneys.

The former East Derry commissioners will be awaiting the council’s decision, and if Nadeau is required to repay the money, the East Derry Fire Precinct can finally become part of town history.