An attorney for the Boston Water and Sewer Commission’s suspended HR Director Marie Theodat has demanded the Herald “cease and desist” all reporting on her client on grounds that this paper’s lawyer has deemed frivolous and lacking legal standing.

Lana Sullivan, an attorney who represents Theodat in at least one of several civil lawsuits filed in Suffolk Superior Court, sent a cease-and-desist letter to the Herald. The letter seeks to prevent further reporting on her client on the grounds that she is a “private” rather than a “public” figure.

Sullivan also wrote that the Herald, in its prior reporting, makes statements that tie private civil litigation Theodat is embroiled in to her job performance at the Boston Water and Sewer Commission — which the attorney takes issue with in her letter.

“As you know, the Boston Herald has published a number of false and defamatory statements purporting to connect the involvement of Ms. Theodat, a private citizen who is not a public figure, in personal civil litigation that is of no legitimate public concern, with her job performance at Boston Water and Sewer Commission,” Sullivan wrote.

“You are hereby notified to cease and desist from publishing any and all further defamatory statements regarding Ms. Theodat, a private citizen, concerning or relating to her job at the Boston Water and Sewer Commission,” Sullivan added.

The Herald’s reporting on Theodat has been based on public records from and provided by the Boston Water and Sewer Commission, and court documents from two of three civil lawsuits that have been filed against Theodat in Suffolk Superior Court and are publicly available through the state trial court website.

The Water and Sewer Commission, a quasi-public agency, was ordered to provide public records to the Herald earlier this month, after this paper appealed to the Secretary of State’s office following ignored requests.

Those records show Theodat is currently suspended on paid administrative leave from the Commission. Payroll records from the agency show Theodat was paid $202,873 for her position as chief human resource officer last year.

Jeffrey Robbins, an attorney for the Herald, dismissed Sullivan’s claims in a response to her letter, saying that the paper’s reporting is “encompassed by the Fair Report Privilege,” which protects the media from defamation lawsuits when reporting on public proceedings.

Such privilege is based, in part, on the public’s right to know about important events.

“First, notwithstanding the fact that the sine qua non of any defamation action is a false and defamatory statement of fact, your email identifies no such statement made by the Herald,” Robbins wrote. “Second, you assert, twice, that your client is a private figure. It does not appear that way to me.

“Third, you appear to complain, although you do not identify what it is that you claim is actionable in any way, about the Herald’s reporting on public proceedings. You do not identify any statement that it made which was false, but as you also know, any such reporting is encompassed by the Fair Report Privilege,” he wrote.

Robbins added, “You demand that the Herald ‘cease and desist’ fair and accurate reporting. We respectfully decline to accede to your demand.”

Public records show Theodat, formerly the Commission’s human resources director, was promoted to chief human resource officer last September and saw salary hikes — amounting to a 61% raise since 2019 — while embroiled in multiple civil lawsuits that include allegations of fraud.

The fraud allegations leveled against Theodat in a Suffolk Superior Court lawsuit became public after they were first reported by the Herald last October.

The lawsuit, filed last August, alleges Theodat worked with relatives to swindle her elderly and dementia-ridden uncle out of his $1.1 million Dorchester home. It alleges she “fraudulently induced” him to sign over the deed to his longtime home for “less than $100” under the “guise” he was signing documents related to his medical care.

At the end of this past November, a Suffolk Superior Court jury issued a verdict in favor of a woman who alleged Theodat stiffed her on a $75,000 mortgage loan. The ruling was made after a weeklong trial related to a separate civil lawsuit filed against Theodat in 2020.

A trio of unions representing Boston Water and Sewer Commission employees sent a letter to Henry Vitale, the commission’s executive director, last October pressing for an internal investigation and for Theodat to be suspended pending the results.

The unions, in their letter, had also requested that Theodat be stripped of her ability to handle sensitive employee information like Social Security and banking numbers, and that the information be transferred to the legal department.

“The allegations filed against the senior HR director are concerning to the unions and its members that we represent,” the unions’ letter stated, in reference to the civil litigation.

The Commission had responded to those calls by saying that it saw the civil lawsuits as having no bearing on Theodat’s employment in a statement that described her as a “valued employee.”

The records provided this month by the Commission cite a privacy exemption while declining to confirm whether an internal investigation was launched.

Theodat has denied all claims in the civil litigation, either through court filings or in a brief phone call with the Herald last October, when she called the complaint filed in August 2024 “fraudulent.”