Baltimore City Solicitor George A. Nilson said Saturday that he believes he was "mistreated" by Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, who fired him from city government Friday without meeting with him.
"While I respect the mayor's right to do what she did, I don't feel it was a just thing to do," Nilson said.
Rawlings-Blake fired Nilson after the city faced embarrassment this week over Nilson's hiring of a contractual employee who turned out to have neo-Nazi ties in his past. Nilson said he had no way of knowing about lawyer Glen K. Allen's past. Allen had been a longtime litigator at DLA Piper, a respected law firm.
Nilson said Saturday that he terminated Allen's contract with the city immediately upon learning of the allegations against him.
"I find it somewhat extraordinary that the mayor would do this without having a conversation with me," Nilson said. "Glen Allen was terminated by me, and he was terminated willingly. The mayor didn't fire him. I did."
Nilson said he has no plans to sue the city over his firing.
A spokesman for the mayor declined to comment Saturday on Nilson's remarks.
Nilson had been city solicitor since 2007. He was paid $166,500 annually.
The news of Nilson's dismissal came one day after the administration announced that it had terminated a contract with Allen, who was the subject of a Southern Poverty Law Center report that he had a history of supporting the neo-Nazi National Alliance.
Allen had been working for the city since February as contract employee handling complex litigation.
In an interview with The Baltimore Sun, Allen said he was a casual member of the group in the late 1980s and early 1990s but had concluded "emphatically that that was a huge mistake."
Allen said in an email on Saturday that "this matter has been an unending nightmare for my family as well as me."
Sun reporter Tim Prudentecontributed to this article.
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