A founder was fired for ignoring the return-to-office rule he helped write — now he's suing for $30 million

William Nieporte and his co-founders sent a note to workers at Bramshill Investments in 2022: Employees would be required to return to the office five days a week. If they were unwilling to do so, they would be offered severance.

A few months later, Nieporte (1)received a letter (1) of his own from his partners: "You have willfully and deliberately failed to report to 'in-person' work," it read. And, for that, he was being let go.

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Now, Nieporte is suing his co-founders, alleging they used the policy, which he maintains did not apply to him, to "usurp" his 12% stake in the company. (Shareholders in Bramshill are required to sell their holdings if they are fired for cause.)

Nieporte filed the lawsuit against ADP Totalsource, the human-resources company Bramshill partnered with, in May. That company was used for his dismissal.

He is seeking $30 million in lost earnings, profits and the value of his 12% stake, according to the suit.

Nieporte and his co-founders, Stephen Selver and Art DeGaetano, have known each other since high school. Nieporte and DeGaetano started Bramshill in 2012. Selver came on board two years later as CEO, taking a 40% stake in Bramshill.

In 2017, the filing says, Nieporte moved to San Ramon, Calif., which was hundreds of miles away from the nearest Bramshill office. He says his cofounders, who approved the move, had tried to buy him out in 2021, but he rejected the offer, calling it a "lowball."

After he did not return to the office by the deadline given to employees, DeGaetano allegedly wrote Nieporte, saying: "We have both junior and senior employees commuting over one hour each way to work, and yet you feel this policy doesn't apply to you." He gave Nieporte 30 days to avoid further action. (Nieporte says the notice wasn't delivered properly and was, thus, invalid.)

The court filing shows the two parties discussed a buyout with "all pending actions on either side" being put on hold for 30 days, but Nieporte was fired before that time period was up.

A spokesperson for Bramshill told The Wall Street Journal that Nieporte was fabricating accusations and the other co-owners did nothing wrong.

While companies have been trying to get workers to return to the office since the work-from-home days of the 2020 pandemic, the success rate for that has been mixed. The number of home-based workers has held fairly steady for the past two years, according to new (2)analysis (2) of Census Bureau Current Population Survey data from the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.

Roughly 22% of U.S. workers worked from home last year. That's just one percentage point lower than 2024. And so far this year, 22.3% of the workforce is home-based at least part of the time.

Separate data from Kastle shows just over 56% (3) of workers at commercial office spaces in the nation's 10 biggest cities are back at the office.

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The Wall Street Journal (1); Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis (2); Kastle (3)

This article originally appeared on Moneywise.com under the title: A founder was fired for ignoring the return-to-office rule he helped write — now he's suing for $30 million

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