CT worker accused of leaking interview questions allowed to retire

Marybeth Bonsignore, a Department of Administrative Services employee accused of leaking interview questions to a woman who would become the chief financial officer at the state Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection, will be allowed to retire effective Feb. 1.

Bonsignore, whose annual salary is about $146,000, will be on paid leave until then, according to the agreement with the state Office of Labor Relations.

By the time she retires, Bonsignore will have been on paid administrative leave for over 13 months.

Bonsignore was hired as a state employee in May 1986, according to state records. Pensions can be revoked only in cases where the employee has been convicted of a crime related to their employment.

The two-page agreement was signed by Bonsignore and attorneys for the Office of Labor Relations on Nov. 27. It forbids her from ever again working for the state of Connecticut.

The state also agrees that if contacted by a potential employer about Bonsignore that it will say only that she is retired and give her dates of employment.

She was put on administrative leave shortly after Ronnell Higgins became commissioner of DESPP and raised questions about Aimee Plourde, the agency’s chief financial officer.

Bonsignore, who had been assigned to work at DESPP, was involved in the May 2022 interview process that led to the hiring of Plourde as one of the highest-ranked civilian positions in the agency.

A three-member committee selected Plourde over one other finalist.  

A 206-page internal affairs report into how Plourde got the job alleges that several state employees colluded to hire her. Plourde acknowledged to investigators she was friends with Bonsignore and that Bonsignore, days before Plourde’s interview, had sent Plourde the questions she was later asked in her interview.

Plourde stayed in the position until December 2023, when Higgins, the new DESPP Commissioner, ordered an internal affairs investigation into how she was hired.

Investigators sustained three charges against Bonsignore including “fraud or collusion in connection with any examination or appointment in the classified service.” 

They also sustained four charges against Plourde, who resigned in June 2024 after the internal affairs investigation was completed. She was earning about $140,000.

The investigation also sustained two charges against Scott Devico, an executive assistant to then-DESPP Commissioner James Rovella and a member of the committee that hired Plourde, for “misleading investigators during his interview” and for “conduct unbecoming a DESPP employee” for texting Bonsignore updates during Plourde’s interview. 

A charge that Devico failed to perform his duties in his position as a hiring manager was not sustained.

The report includes text messages and emails from government and private accounts that show Plourde did not have the relevant experience to perform the job, which state officials referred to as “the backbone” of the state agency.

One of those text exchanges occurred between Devico and Bonsignore during Plourde’s final interview on April 11, 2022.

Despite being tipped to the questions she’d be asked, Plourde was not doing well in the interview, prompting Devico to text Bonsignore in the middle of the interview:

“I don’t think I am going to be able to justify putting Aimee ahead of (the other candidate) … She doesn’t seem to have the Core CT, procurement, etc. experience”. 

Bonsignore replied, “Oh no. If the team doesn’t feel confident in Aimee — can you tell them you want another date to discuss it — so that you don’t have to commit to recommending or not recommending anyone right now?”

Devico responded back, “It’s going to be hard because we have been discussing each one after the interview.”

Bonsignore texted back, “This is not good. Aimee would be much better than [redacted] at running the whole unit — she just doesn’t have the technical skills.”

Devico also noted that officials from the state’s Equal Employment Opportunities office were involved in the interview. The other finalist was a Black woman, according to the internal affairs report.