Deputy Opts for New Sex Harassment Trial

A former Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy retired on stress disability has decided to reject a Superior Court judge’s decision that sharply reduced sexual harassment damages awarded her by a jury and to go to a new trial, probably before the same judge.

The judge had reduced the $81,750 jury award to $20,000 and had given her the option of accepting that or going to a new trial.

The prime issue over damages in the case of Yvonne Johnson is whether harassment against her was consistent, meriting damages, as the jury felt, or only sporadic and without pattern, not reflecting the management of the Sheriff’s Department, as concluded later by Judge John Zebrowski.

But the case also illustrates, in the view of Joe C. Hopkins, Johnson’s attorney, the obstacles for deputies and civilian personnel who seek compensation for alleged sexual harassment. He said the judge has set such rigorous standards for determining whether harassment is consistent and management-caused as to make them almost impossible to meet.

Hopkins said he will tell Zebrowski at a hearing Oct. 28 that Johnson wants a new trial, even if it has to be before the judge who has taken such a restricted view of her right to recover damages.

The Johnson suit is one of half a dozen harassment lawsuits pending against the Sheriff’s Department in the wake of a recent consent decree in which the department agreed to work to improve the status of its women.

About 12.5% of the 7,500 uniformed sheriff’s deputies and about 66% of the 3,700 civilian personnel are women.

In papers submitted recently in connection with the consent decree, the Sheriff’s Department said there were 26 verified complaints of sexual harassment in its uniformed and civilian ranks in 1990, 1991 and 1992, and that during the same years nine employees were fired as a result, one resigned and one was allowed to retire.

The papers also listed one harassment lawsuit from a man and eight from women, although three lawsuits had been dismissed.

Johnson, a 13-year deputy with a college degree in criminal justice, asserted that during her first nine years in the Sheriff’s Department, there was no persistent pattern of sexual harassment, but said that situation changed when she was assigned to the transportation bureau, which takes inmates to and from court appearances.

There, she testified, she was “subjected. . . to an environment where sexually abusive and degrading language in referring to all women was commonplace,” where male officers would grab their crotches and make suggestive comments, where she was given “bad shift assignments” after filing grievances, was routinely made the object of posters with sexual themes and was placed in dangerous situations.

For instance, she said, she was assigned to escort serial killer Richard Ramirez, the so-called Night Stalker, from his cell to court, alone in a van, when other officers assigned such duties were given substantial backup.

Overtime sign-up sheets had a column wherein male deputies could refuse overtime with women. In one instance, 11 of 12 did.

In another instance, Johnson said she found a clipping at work of another woman with the same name who had been fatally stabbed and whose body had been dumped on a street. Several male deputies, including a supervisor, made fun of this, she said, with such comments as, “What are you doing here, Yvonne? You’re supposed to be dead.”

That same night, someone called her mother at home and told her that Johnson had been killed. A department investigation found the call had been placed from the transportation bureau late at night.

After a seven-day trial, the jury deliberated three days before finding a pattern of harassment and retaliation and awarded Johnson $81,750.

In cutting the damages by more than 75%, Zebrowski said in an eight-page opinion issued July 15 that the case “showed no pattern” of harassment against Johnson.

“Instead of pattern, the evidence showed a collection of random acts over several years by different persons, at different times, in different places, under different circumstances and of disparate nature.”

Johnson, the judge said, “repeatedly presented evidence of crude, cruel or otherwise offensive conduct without showing or attempting to show a link between that conduct and the management of the Sheriff’s Department.”

For instance, he said, “The evidence of the telephone call (to her mother) illustrates the lack of connection to management. There was no evidence whatever to link this cruel hoax to the management of the Sheriff’s Department.

“The evidence was undisputed that the matter was fully investigated when disclosed. Nevertheless, the plaintiff presented this inflammatory evidence without any attempt to link it to management or to show that the information was ignored when provided.”

All told, this did not reflect sexual harassment, Judge Zebrowski said, but he agreed there had been “generally weak” evidence of retaliation when Johnson complained, and said he would approve the jury verdict of $20,000 for that.

“We were offered a $40,000 settlement in the case by the county counsel (defending the sheriff’s office),” Hopkins said in disgust.