Oregon Lottery Director Jack Roberts, fired Tuesday by Gov. Kate Brown, said Wednesday that Brown axed him after he took steps to protect a high-ranking agency employee who claimed her supervisor had harassed and intimidated her.

Brown is free to fire and hire state agency directors as she wishes. Her communications director said unspecified "management problems" prompted Brown to seek a new lottery director and denied Roberts' firing was connected to his putting the supervisor on leave.

Roberts, a Republican and former state labor commissioner, agreed Brown had the right to dismiss him and is not trying to get the job back.

But he said the governor's office questioned his management only once: When Brown's chief of staff, Kristin Leonard, asked him Monday afternoon to reinstate the employee accused of harassment. The next day, without further discussion, Leonard told Roberts to resign or he would be fired, Roberts said.

Roberts provided The Oregonian/OregonLive with an account of recent events at the Oregon Lottery, an agency of about 400 employees that Roberts ran for 21/2 years after former Gov. John Kitzhaber asked him to take the job:

Jack Roberts served as director of the Oregon Lottery for 2 1/2 years, after former Gov. John Kitzhaber asked him to take the job. He is a Republican and had served as state labor commissioner for eight years. On Tuesday, Gov. Kate Brown fired him, citing management problems.

Last week, Roberts said, the agency's human resources director, Janell Simmons, told him the agency's deputy director, Roland Iparraguirre, had harassed and intimidated her during a confrontation, leaving her in tears.

On Monday, when Iparraguirre returned from an out-of-town conference, Roberts said he put Iparraguirre on paid leave so Simmons could feel safe while her allegations are investigated. Roberts said he also asked retired Oregon Supreme Court Chief Justice Paul DeMuniz to investigate the allegations.

Simmons, through a lottery spokeswoman, said Wednesday she could not comment on a personnel matter. Iparraguirre, who is still on leave, could not be reached for comment.

Later Monday, Roberts said, Leonard called and said Brown and her staff wanted Roberts to reinstate Iparraguirre.

Roberts said he explained why he did not want to: As a former labor commissioner, he knew the recommended practice after a credible report of harassment against a supervisor is to put the alleged harasser, not the person claiming to be the victim, on leave.

Roberts said Leonard cautioned him that might not apply in this instance, because Iparraguirre might have "whistleblower status."

Roberts said he was stunned because Iparraguirre had never complained to him about any agency misdeeds. Roberts said he pressed Leonard to tell him what Iparraguirre had "blown the whistle on," but she did not tell him.

Leonard then suggested that she and Roberts discuss the case with a state human resources officer and a state lawyer Tuesday, Roberts said. Also Monday, DeMuniz called him and agreed to investigate Simmons' claim, Roberts said.

At the Tuesday meeting, he said, without any other discussion of agency matters, Leonard told Roberts that the governor "wanted to go in a new direction" and that he should resign.

Roberts said he asked whether he would be fired if he declined; Leonard said yes. Roberts ultimately chose to be fired, reasoning that he did not wish to lie about his true reason for leaving.

Kristen Grainger, Brown's communications director, said Wednesday that she could not go into detail about the reports of personnel problems and "chaos" at lottery headquarters that reached the governor's office. But she said Roberts was not fired for declining to reinstate Iparraguirre.

The governor's office did not ask Brown's handpicked interim director, Barry Pack, to reinstate Iparraguirre, nor has Pack reinstated him of his own accord.

Officials from the Department of Justice and the Department of Administrative Services are reviewing personnel matters in the executive offices at the lottery, including claims of intimidation, Grainger said.

"Any time there is an allegation of bullying or harassment, the governor is going to look into it," she said. "That's unquestionable."

Grainger said she could not say more about the problems and complaints. But, she said, "our goal is to resolve those. Was the deputy causing some of those problems or not? That's one piece of a larger puzzle."

She said Brown also wanted someone she chose as lottery director, not someone chosen by her predecessor.

"She needs a leadership," Grainger said, "that is going to go the same way she wants to go."

-- Betsy Hammond