Former Comptroller Files $100,000 Coop Lawsuit

A $100,000 lawsuit against the Harvard Cooperative Society has been filed by a past comptroller. Coop officials revealed yesterday.

Louis Loss.--professor of Law and general counsel to the Coop, said that the suit was filed several weeks ago by Fred Fox, the former Coop comptroller, for alleged "breach of contract."

For resigned in September after three years as overseer of security and accounting operations. A director of the Society said last week that the lawsuit arose when talks between Fox and the Coop snagged on questions about benefits to which Fox claimed to be entitled.

Fox refused to comment yesterday on the suit.

"It might be months before it (the case) comes to a hearing," Loss said. "He's asking for around $100,000, and we don't think we owe him anything."

Fox's suit represents the third legal action against the Coop revealed in the past month. On October 13, a former Coop director sued to nullify last spring's board of directors election on technical grounds, and shortly afterwards a local retail union disclosed an ongoing National Labor Relations Board investigation into alleged Coop intimidation of union organizers.

Donald Steele, author of the election lawsuit, said yesterday that he thought Fox and the Coop "parted ways" in mutual hostility.

"There is no question they tried to force him out, the way they forced out (John) Roberts (former Coop accounts payable manager)," he said. "Fox and Roberts blocked a highly questionable invoice from the Harvard Trust in 1970 which the Coop general manager wanted paid, and from then on they were put on the defensive by Coop management."

Coop president Milton H. Brown, Filene Professor of Retailing at the Business School, said last week he "didn't know anything about" a fraudulent 1970 Trust invoice.

Steele said yesterday he could not believe that Brown was unaware of the invoice in question. "Even the student directors were informed in the fall of 1970 of Fox's refusal to pay it," he said. "It seems to me I obtained a copy of the invoice at some point and I think it's probably still in my files."