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Papa John's founder said he "made a mistake" by agreeing to resign from his position as chairman of the company's board of directors last week.
In a letter addressed to the members of the board of directors of the company, the founder of the pizza chain, John Schnatter, stated that the members of the board of directors had pushed him to resign without "any investigation".
"The board has asked me to resign from his presidential position without apparently investigating." I agree, even though today I believe that this is the case. was a mistake to do it, "said Schnatter, according to a copy of the letter obtained by ABC News on Tuesday. "I checked with corporate governance experts who said that it was not an appropriate action by the board."
Rob Kim / Getty Images, FILE Patty Glaser, a lawyer representing Schlatter on the board of directors, wrote in a separate letter on July 15 that the "board of directors did not have the power to dismiss Mr. Schnatter as a director "and called for" an independent investigation himself as to what actually occurred. "
Glaser warns that "the failure to conduct a full and independent investigation" would make "the members of the Board of Directors liable for any resulting damages to the Company and to Mr. Schnatter".
Schnatter faced a violent reaction last week after Forbes reported that he used the N-word during a conference call in May while discussing the protests of the day. national anthem in the NFL.
"Colonel Sanders called the blacks n ——", said Schnatter, referring to Kentucky Fried Chicken founder Harland Sanders, according to the Forbes report.
Kim Rob / Getty Images, FILE Schnatter apologized for remarks last Wednesday and agreed to resign from his post as president of Papa John a few hours later.
He also resigned from his position on the board of directors of the University of Louisville last week, according to the school. He served on the board for two years.
The Kentucky pizza chain had tested advertisements to see if Schnatter was to be reintroduced "with significant success," according to his letter to the board of directors, but the company seems to reconsider this relationship now.
"Racism and insensitive language, no matter the context, simply can not be tolerated at any level of our society," said CEO Steve Ritchie in a statement released this weekend. end. "It was also decided that it would no longer appear in any of the advertising or marketing media associated with the brand."
Schnatter, currently the largest shareholder of the company, did not disclose details of the current state of the relationship in the letter.
The Associated Press He accused the enterprise to not have the capacity to "handle a crisis based on misinformation".
"The corporate governance experts I consulted said that it was not the appropriate action of a director or board of directors ", says the letter. "I am confident that a review of the facts will confirm what I wrote in this letter and show that once again our company has demonstrated that it did not know how to handle a crisis." based on misinformation. "
Schnatter, 56, resigned from his role as CEO last year after stating that the NFL players were to defend the national anthem and that their protests had harmed the company's sales. ;business. These comments had precipitated his initial withdrawal of advertisements.
He is still a member of the board of directors of the company.
ABC News' Darren Reynolds and Henderson Hewes contributed to this report.
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