City Bans Personal Questions to Lesbian

Responding to a complaint by the ACLU, the Los Angeles city attorney’s office vowed Friday to limit the scope of its questioning of a lesbian police officer who has several personnel claims against the city.

In addition, the office promised to train employees on appropriate interview tactics regarding personal matters.

The new policies, presented to the City Council in executive session, came 10 days after the American Civil Liberties Union filed its legal challenge against city attorneys, who were asking the officer the names of her friends, roommates and lovers during depositions. Several City Council members had berated the attorneys for pursuing such personal queries, but Friday they joined the ACLU and the officer’s lawyer in praising the quick resolution to the controversy.

“It really shows that the city attorney’s office realized it had overstepped its constitutional bounds,” said ACLU attorney Taylor Flynn. “I’m really pleased that the response was so swift and that it was at a policy level as well, so this doesn’t happen to other people.”

The case concerns Los Angeles Police Department Officer Virgina Acevedo, who has been out on stress disability for about three years and claims she was harassed on the job because of her gender and sexual orientation.

The ACLU got involved Jan 9., filing a brief that accused the city of violating Acevedo’s privacy and that of her unnamed friends and partners.

On Friday, the city attorney’s office pledged to limit the scope of questions by attorneys and the worker’s compensation board to the “existence of relationships, general natures of relationships, effect of relationships on stress of claimant.”

Regarding future cases, the city attorney’s office promised to keep the scope of questions narrow “in areas involving personal relationships” and to train all lawyers in the worker’s compensation division how to handle such matters.

Council member Jackie Goldberg, who is gay and said last week that the city attorney’s questioning offended her more than anything had since she took office, on Friday said she was completely satisfied.

“I don’t think you can get any more thorough response than that,” Goldberg said.