Newport Beach Police Chief, Aide Put on Leave Over Rape Allegations : Lawsuit: Dispatcher joins four other plaintiffs. She says both men assaulted her 11 years ago after a party.

A police dispatcher charged Thursday that Police Chief Arb Campbell and a captain both raped her 11 years ago during a drunken party at an Orange County landfill and threatened her job repeatedly if she ever told anyone.

Newport Beach City Manager Kevin J. Murphy responded by placing both Campbell and Capt. Anthony Villa on paid administrative leave and appointing an acting chief, Capt. Jim Jacobs. The action came a day after Campbell announced he would retire in May.

Dispatcher Peri Ropke, 33, made the allegation as she joined a lawsuit by four current and former female Newport Beach Police Department employees who have charged that they were sexually harassed on and off the job by Villa, and that his close friend Campbell condoned it.

“Working for Arb and Tony for the last 11 years, it was very difficult. I was constantly living in fear,” Ropke said in a brief interview with The Times before a news conference, where she read a two-sentence statement. It concluded: “I hope that by (my) coming forward, other women will have the courage to do the same.”

Campbell and Villa were not available for comment Thursday, but their city-hired attorney, Bruce Praet, said they deny any sexual contact with Ropke. Praet also characterized as “a fantasy” Ropke’s assertion of having had an affair with Villa before the alleged rape put an end to the liaison.

At a hastily called afternoon news conference a few hours after Ropke’s, Murphy read the following statement at City Hall, refusing to answer questions:

“I’ve decided that it is in the best interests of the city, the Police Department, Chief Arb Campbell and Capt. Tony Villa that I place Chief Campbell and Capt. Villa on paid administrative leave, and I’ve done so this afternoon.”

“I’m not by this action passing any judgment upon Chief Campbell and Capt. Villa. However, my decision is based upon the allegations of serious misconduct and the impact those allegations have on the ability to manage the department and perform their duties.”

Mayor Phil Sansone said the City Council had approved Murphy’s decision to put both men on paid leave, and expressed concerned about the lawsuit’s impact at the police station. “We certainly can’t have a police force that’s completely demoralized,” Sansone said.

Praet said the chief and captain were “very disappointed at the city’s decision” to put them on administrative leave because “the obvious inference that most people will draw from this action . . . is that there’s a hint of merit to these allegations and there isn’t.”

“We’re going to respond on our own and set these people for independent psychiatric evaluation which, we think, especially in Ropke’s case, will be very enlightening,” Praet said. “We will be setting depositions (to) force these people to make these allegations under penalty of perjury, instead of through the mouths of their attorneys.”

According to allegations in the amended lawsuit filed Thursday in Orange County Superior Court by attorney Steven R. Pingel, the rape occurred on a Saturday night in July, 1981.

Ropke, then 22, finished her dispatcher’s shift and arrived about 2 a.m. at a department party at the Bonita Canyon landfill, just inside the city limits of neighboring Irvine.

Alcohol was provided at the party, and Ropke “consumed beer and tequila,” the lawsuit states. It outlines how the attacks allegedly occurred:

At 4 a.m., then-Sgt. Villa offered to drive Ropke home because he and then-Capt. Campbell believed she was drunk. At the time, Pingel said, Ropke and Villa had carried on an affair for several months. Villa pushed Ropke to the middle of his truck’s front seat, getting into the passenger side while Campbell climbed behind the wheel.

But instead of driving her home, the lawsuit states, Campbell drove to the outskirts of the dump, where Villa forced her into the truck’s camper and Campbell followed.

Both men “started removing plaintiff’s blouse and fondling her breasts. At the same time, Villa tore her pants off. Plaintiff, still crying and in shock, submitted to the force used by both Villa and Campbell,” the lawsuit states.

“Plaintiff was then compelled to submit to various sex acts, against her will, and was raped by both Campbell and Villa,” the lawsuit says.

“After the forced sex acts were completed, Campbell and Villa left the camper, leaving plaintiff crying, in a state of shock and naked in the rear of the camper. Villa got out and walked back to the party,” the lawsuit says.

Campbell, the lawsuit says, drove out of the dump as Ropke began dressing. At the police station parking lot, the lawsuit contends, Campbell ordered Ropke out of the camper and “told her never to discuss what happened with anybody, threatening retaliation. He then drove off.”

For the next 10 years, the lawsuit alleges, Campbell and Villa told Ropke to be “a good girl” and “keep her mouth shut.” Villa warned her that Campbell was a force to be reckoned with who fancied the job as chief, and that Villa would ride his coattails, according to the lawsuit.

Senior Orange County Deputy Dist. Atty. Dennis Bauer said Thursday that an accusation of rape would have had to be made within six years of the alleged crime for his office to have considered charges, under the statute of limitations.

Pingel did not attempt to explain Ropke’s failure to report the alleged rapes for 11 years, and said he would not begin to pretend he could analyze her silence.